AIFF earning 10 to 20% of what it could: Prabhakaran

Dialogue has replaced diktat, Shaji Prabhakaran said while explaining what has changed at All India Football Federation (AIFF) since Kalyan Chaubey became president last September. On Saturday, AIFF rolled out its strategic 25-year roadmap. Prabhakaran, the AIFF secretary general, said he understood the scepticism because “it has not lived up to most of the things in the past.” “But if we create a positive environment, people will start believing.”

In this interview, Prabhakaran explained some of the whys and hows of a plan that, along with accepting unpleasant truths, has set targets such as 500% increase in revenue by 2026 and being among the top four teams in Asia by 2047. Excerpts:

The Vision plan has set a 500% increase in revenue as target by 2026. AIFF’s total revenue now is around ₹80cr. How can it be made around ₹400cr?

This is fundamental. If we can’t grow to that level, we will not be able to achieve most of what we have listed. That said, AIFF has been working on very limited possibilities of generating revenue. I would say we were earning 10 to 20% of what we could. So, we have to explore how we can generate more revenue over the next four years. At the same time, we must try and bring down the negativity around football. That too can attract more investment. AIFF has now created a business and marketing vertical for this. India is an economic power but that is not reflected in football. Yet, AIFF’s revenue grew from around ₹5 crore 15 years ago to ₹80 crore. So, we are confident.

But broadcast revenue which, as per AIFF, generates nearly 40% of revenue, is nearly non-existent in India. So, what explains your confidence?

To generate that kind of money from television rights is not something we are looking at before 2047. In the near-term, there are many other sources we can tap into. We will share details when we can but based on internal assessments, I can say a 500% increase is not a random figure.

A written “National Football Philosophy of India” is part of the roadmap. Who will create this?

The AIFF’s technical department. The first step is to have a new technical director and there will be one by February. It will take a year or two to develop the plan is because it will need consultation with former players, coaches and experts from outside India. It will define our coaching curriculum and player development process. Right now, players don’t come through any designed system; we don’t know what kind of players we need. A coach decides how we should play and that changes with the end of the coach’s cycle. The philosophy will provide continuity.

Will Arsene Wenger’s inputs as FIFA’s chief of global football development be taken for this?

No, but work with his team has started. He should be visiting India sometime this year.

There is a proposal to integrate zonal leagues into the competitions’ pyramid. How will this be structured?

We need more teams and more games in a season and zonal leagues will help provide that. We are working on the eligibility criteria but there will be five zones and 12 teams in each. By 2026, we aim to have 60 teams. Initially, games could be at a centralised venue but eventually it will be a home-and-away league. The number of teams from each state eligible for this league will depend on the strength of the state’s league. There can be more than the champions from a state league playing in that zone.

The success of this roadmap hinges on how AIFF’s affiliates deliver. By your own admission, 11 of the 36 affiliates don’t hold regular leagues and many that do are short.

If we want more competitions, we need greater involvement from states. If more players are to come through, it will be through states. If we want 35 games at youth level, states have to facilitate that. We have to build their capacity through dialogue, hand-holding and investment. AIFF has started a financial assistance project where we are funding states’ hiring key people. We will put in place a transparent self-evaluation policy and there will be incentives for states that exceed expectation. We have to teach the states to catch fish, not give them fish.

In my time as Football Delhi president (2017-22), I never had a dialogue with AIFF on how we could grow. There were only diktats. Now there is some conversation every fortnight and we are getting to understand each other. We tell states we are partners.

Around 20% of clubs having residential academies is a target. But the plan also acknowledges how difficult it is for clubs to make such investments given that everyone is bleeding money. How do you reconcile this?

A: Like with states, we need close collaboration with clubs. Clubs are far away from dialogue with AIFF. That can’t happen as most of the money in football comes from them. Clubs need to be the centre of player development. That is not the case today.

Through dialogue maybe we can point out that by not investing in academies, they are blocking out one revenue stream. We can show them that FC Goa, Bengaluru FC, Sreenidhi FC are investing so they can learn from clubs in India. And those who are investing heavily in the first team and not on youth development, well, we can talk to them. They know that we are not asking for their money! And the good thing is that they are already investing a serious amount.

Getting a coaches’ professional licence requires around ₹7-8 lakh. Yet AIFF talks of having 72 Pro Licence holders by 2026 from the current 17.

A: If we can grow the competitive structure – more teams, more competitions and longer leagues from youth to senior levels – which is imperative for our football to develop, there will be greater demand for coaches. If there are more schools, there will be a greater demand for teachers. We are targeting 100 professional clubs by 2047. Each club can employ 30 to 40 coaches.

To bring more coaches into the system, AIFF is working on developing curricula in regional languages, starting with Hindi which should be ready by this year. The coaches’ penetration in the Hindi-speaking belt is low.