source: Press Trust of India
date: 6 July 2009
editing: fcbtransfers.blogspot.com
The Dubai leg of their training ending on Monday, the Indian footballers are looking ahead to the one month-long sojourn in Barcelona where they will use the facilities of Champions League winners FC Barcelona.
The Indian team will leave for Barcelona on Tuesday morning after a 10-day training in Dubai in preparation for the Nehru Cup. The team will return to India on August 7 and will have a short camp before defending the Nehru Cup title between August 19 and 31.
Senior team member Renedy Singh said they have achieved what they wanted from the Dubai leg, to get into the groove as a unit and work on the fitness to prepare for the Barcelona leg of the national team's training: "We have not been together since the friendly against Hong Kong in January so Dubai leg was more about getting into the groove and work on our fitness. In Barcelona we will play a few matches and test ourselves in match situations," said the midfielder.
Renedy said all the players are excited about training in FC Barcelona, especially the younger lot: "We will be using facilities of one of the most famous clubs in the world. The Nou Camp will be face to face with us for the first time in our lives and naturally it is amazing feeling," he said.
Central defender Gouramangi Singh can't wait any longer for the Barcelona trip: "The last trip to Portugal did us a lot of good. The facilities were great and it should be better in Spain. I am dying to go to Barcelona. I think the European tour is especially good for us youngsters in the side. We will learn a lot from the trip."
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29 comments:
Was wondering when this would show up on the blog :)
Hope we improve..
am expeting posts from sashi, harsh and co..lol... make sure u destroy nothing.. lol.. jst teasing
I was wondering why the many Indian readers of this blog didn't tell me anything about this and it was a sweet Phillipina girl who had to inform me??!!
But I guess you're just too embarassed about your national team.. ;)
indian football team = worst in the world. we are ranked 147, behind marshall islands and cape verde. how much more proof do we need? i just hope they would play barca, it will be so much fun. barcelona 15-0 india. shameful, really.
Hey, they WON the Nehru Cup, they can't be THAT bad...
lol.. 147? I tot my country was getting worse, now I am happy.
And Pep, whos da sweet girl.. hook a bruva up.. lol...
kidding..
She sees you, she reads you, so behave a little...
Anurag : honestly speaking, i just know like 3 or 4 players' names in the national team but dont u think its bad to say our national team is the worst??? we can just say tat football is not our sport although we are trying our best to develop.
and Pep, thanx a lot for the post! looking forward for a Barca youth camp in India. hopefully, i'll admit my son there ;) (tat is, after i get married n have kids).
and Nou, too bad i dont know anyone from the team. else, would've surely asked them to tear something from somewhere as a souvenir for me ;) or atleast buy something :D
We are lowly ranked in football only because Indians are not physically that strong and tall. And the facilities provided here are pitiful.
In about 20 odd years I am sure we will get better.. I'm not being sarcastic or anything.. it can only get better, right?
It has been in news all over for quite some time now Pep, but it was just that the players were getting mighty excited about the trip. Will keep you updated and send links once they actually get there :)
We're pathetic, there's no two ways about that.
But I've seen that football is now more popular than cricket, at least amongst the youngsters.
With the right direction and initiatives, i guess we'll get somewhere. One billion people - not 11 decent players.
My dream is to see India play the World Cup before I die. We won the under-15 Asian Cup last year, so I do have a hope.
Amen.
lol.. the Juvenil and Infantil teams would hammer us.. we're that bad..
Well Barca shows us that not being physical or tall is not a hindrance in order to play well.. It's the lack of facilities, improper planning, lack of interest and too much red tape that ails Indian football..
We went last year to a Portuguese 3rd division club and were impressed by the training facilities there (that is what Gourmangi Singh meant) then imagine what those in India must be like..
Our youngsters do well nowadays but its downhill from there..
We need a major overhaul in the football administration to even dream about qualifying for the WC..
lol I am commenting after like a month.. and nice post to be back into commenting groove..
its nice that the players get to see and play at the camp nou
dude actually FCB have just last year opened an academy in india in my state of andhra pradesh, joan laporta came over for the inaugration they even published an article about it in the FCB official website. its actually a foundation which is both a charity work and a small football academy for young kids.
i really do hope india improve in football and we can get to the world cup someday:).
oh btw theres a player called sunil chhetri in india, hes the best player in our country i hope he would get noticed while indian national team trains there and gets an chance in the barca atletic. hes got a lot of potential but hes never been exposed to higher chalenges which rendered his growth, hes a second striker like and in think he could make it.
HOPEFULLY someday an INDIAN will make it to the FCB!!!
yeah.... facilities is bad. the money spent on football is negligible compared to tat on cricket. hope ppl realise the need to improve footall and make the right steps to it. its a dream for me to see India qualify for World Cup Finals. someday!
well happy to some connection of barca wit india.
seriously we indians r best at one thing above all degrading n insulting ourselves n making others look good n praise them. instead of sitting here and commenting i think even one of you had joined some indian club and had some first hand experience then one of you wud have thought before commenting.
its not like its coz of lack of physical ability its coz people with the ability rarely ever take teh interest as a profession, football or any other sport is never encouraged in india ya cricket is but study, study is everything here. u can be messi but if u didnt get good marks then your worth nothing. i agree education is extremely important but not everyone has teh interest or brains.
plus teh govt. doesnt invest at all. more than teh facilities its teh knowledge n to an extent teh inborn talent thats missing. but teh low level of knowledge among teh coaches here is alarming, teh coaches just dont know how to improve a players ability. they just give teh ball and let them play over and over and over again without passing proper knowledge of teh game. we do have talent but no one to harness it. i really wish to see indian one day play in teh world cups would be a dream come true. and plss instead of hammering this country like all indians try to help it.
ok Pep, wld behave. And hi sweet girl.
That was not in Andhra Pradesh that academy is in kerela I guess.. I have a friend there who actually met Joan Laporta..
football like any enterprise needs basic infrastructure... Sunil chhetri gave trial for conevtry city which is coached by ex-fulham manager chris coleman...
as someone has already mentioned our under-15 team won asian championships.. and also our senior team won AFC challenge cup.. second tier tournament of Asia (much like Uefa Cup)...
we're getting there and improving.. our youth teams are much better than the seniors.. but we need propoer training for them right at the time where there careers peak.. 16-19 years old.. that is when they need proper support.. I hope AIFF has some roadmap for this
guys you're still lucky, your boys get to be invited to train in camp nou, and your league gets visits from the likes of diego maradona. not many asian footballing nations can say that. so cheer up hehe.
xaviniesta
indian football is behind due to corruption and bloody politics
even though the talent is not up to the european level but still there r may good players who's talent is wasted
we have register our own team for 6th div ..... there r no facilities provided atleast basic ...every thg runs on money if u want to directly qualify pay sme cash
in indian team also ... look the footballers r part of reality shows .... player selection is also too biased....over aged players play in small age grp...!!!!
Too much washing of dirty linen in public.
The muck in AIFF is enough to stain us all from head-to-toe and still fill in all the craters in Neptune.
All we can do is hope that talent does get recognition and comes to the fore.
Be foolishly positive, because that is the best option available. PEACE and Jai Ho!!
C'mon ppl .. i've seen our indian team play many times and we are not that bad at all. when you say 147, it comes to anyone's mind that we are a shitty team... but its not that bad. we do have good players like Sunil Chettri, Steven Dias, Baichung, Pradeep. We need good support from our government, and make people realize that football is lot more beautiful than Cricket!
@shekhu
no dude its in andhra pradesh am pretty sure as it is in my state, i don't really remember the name of the village this academy was established though.
anyways i guess its more about the sport getting recognition more than anything. Before tennis used to be a rarity in india, but once sania mirza emerged thousands of young kids started taking tennis as their prefession. i guess if something like that happens and some big star from india emerges then suddenly you wold see that football in india would improve in leaps and bounds. After all its 1 big star out of a billion population hope that big star comes soon and hope he plays for FCB someday:)
at my place i do feel that football is getting more popularity than cricket but it will take time will depend much more on the performance of the national team for football to grow
does ne 1 play here football in senior div in bombay ???
my nxt macth is in rey road
Indian football has gotten a huge boost from FC Barcelona.. Not just with this training facility usage, but recently the Blaugrana held a clinic there emphasizing on the youth. Not only was there education for the players but also for coaches. I predict in 10 years time with some support and financial backing, India will be the next Asian powerhouse.
Sadly, the same can't be said about Malaysian football. We're in a very sorry state and everyone in the country is doing their best to help football (parents coaching teams in youth football competitions, imagine that) BUT our FA themselves. They were the reason for our decline and they are the reason we stayed declining. I mean, over here you need an eff-in degree to get a coaching course done.
Pep, you meant a sweet FILIPINA girl, right? From the Philippines? If you did, sweet !!! I'm from the Philippines too !!!
Pep, thanx for the news on the blog. Was really waiting to appear it here. This is my first post and its really nice to see India being linked to FCB someway. :)
sashi,if india is ranked 147.then,barca won't waste their time putiing in youth camps there.although there are always exceptioins.BTW,i didn't know you were indian.
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