When he succumbed to a prolonged illness last November, South Goa villager Domingos Colaco had almost given up on his biggest wish — to see his son Delton grow into a professional footballer. Now that the 15-year-old has bagged an opportunity that only a few budding Indian footballers in the past have, the joy is not without a tinge of regret.
Far away in the national Capital, Delhi Police constable Subhash Maan learnt about the same opportunity for his son Shivam and grew suspicious. His police instincts told him that it could well be one of those ponzi schemes promising to make one rich overnight. Mr. Maan admits to pinching himself and carrying out a bit of investigation for reassurance.
Delton and Shivam are two of the 15 selected boys who have left for Germany for a six-year training programme under coaches from German football club TSG 1899 Hoffenheim and will also receive guidance from the organisers of popular league Bundesliga.
The programme, U-Dream, is an initiative by U Sports, the sports division of Unilazer Ventures founded by entrepreneur Ronnie Screwvala. The selection is the result of a scouting that involved over 1000 boys in 45 schools from different parts of India.
While the trend of Indian footballers going for short term training in Europe has been catching up for a while, they have been short-terms, which get over in a few months. The U-Dream training programme is made with a long-term plan of importing the German football culture, which relies more on grooming local players than buying expensive players in auctions or window transfers in European club football.
This, however, required some efforts he added. “For training young prodigies and letting them learn the ropes with local talent, European clubs prefer members from the countries which are ranked among the top 50 in the sport. With India placed at 150, it took a lot of convincing for the club to make an exception for this batch. The parents also needed a lot of assurances to agree to allow their children make a career choice like this,” said Mr. Screwvala.
Also travelling with the team will be Indian coaches and a set of three teachers who will take care of the schooling under CBSE curriculum for all the boys. Additionally, they would be taught German and another foreign language.
The goal for all the boys – which include six from Maharashtra, three from Goa, three from UP, one from Delhi, Odisha, Rajasthan - remains playing the different European leagues such as English Premier League, Bundesliga and La Liga. All the expenses for the project are being incurred by U Sports except for the training of four of them whose parents are financing their programme.
