All India Football Federation president Praful Patel may consider appointing a big name as national team coach only if the candidate fits their criteria, saying the appointment will be done at the earliest.
The AIFF has received more than 250 applications for the topjob, post of which was left vacant after Stephen Constantine resigned followingthe Indian team’s failure to make the knockouts of the AFC Asian Cup aftercoming close.
Among the 250-odd applicants, sources close to thefederation said 35 of them are well-known names from Europe and elsewhere.
“If the candidate fulfils the criteria, what we are lookingat, and if he is well-qualified, then we can think of that (appointing a bigname),” the AIFF chief told PTI.
“The appointment will be made as soon as possible, maybe bythe end of this month,” he added.
Patel was Saturday elected as a FIFA Council member,becoming the first Indian to enter the prestigious panel in a landmarkdevelopment.
Patel won with a record-breaking margin, securing 38 out ofthe 46 votes at the 29th Asian Football Confederation congress in Kuala Lumpur.A member of parliament, the 62-year-old also addressed the AFC congress onbehalf of its president Shaikh Salman bin Ebrahim Al Khalifa, who was mourningthe demise of his mother.
The list of applicants for the Indian coaching job alsoincludes candidates from the Indian Super League and I-League.
A short-list will be prepared this week and the candidateswould then be interviewed by the technical committee, and based on itsrecommendations, the executive committee would make the appointment from amongthe final list.
Established names doing the rounds are Italian Giovanni DeBiasi, Hakan Ericson of Sweden, France’s Raymond Domnech and England’s Sam Allardyce.
The deadline for applying for the top job ended on March 29.
Among others, Bengaluru FC’s highly successful former coachAlbert Roca has also emerged as the frontrunner for the job, with many nationalteam players favouring his appointment.
Under Roca, Bengaluru FC played four finals in his twoseasons in charge – making the final of the AFC Cup in 2016, the Federation Cupin 2017 and the ISL and Super Cup in 2018.
The team won the Federation Cup and the Super Cup, but missed out on the AFC Cup and the ISL titles.