 Hello and let's talk about the iLeague qualifiers. Mohammedin Sporting Club, one of the story football clubs in the country, has emerged on top of the iLeague qualifiers that conclude today. The iLeague is of course the second tier in the club football seen in the country, with the Indian Super League or the ISL being the top tournament. Though the calendar is not out yet, the 2021 season of the iLeague is likely to begin in Kolkata in December, while the ISL could begin in Goa in November. The qualifiers were the first major sporting event held in India following the pandemic, and they were staged in an eco bubble in three venues in Kolkata. Now there were some off-the-pitch controversy as well, as the coach of Mohammedin SC Yan Law quit after allegations of match fixing were thrown about. Despite this, the team came on top and will play in the iLeague. So what are the lessons from the qualifiers, where at least two cases of COVID-19 were recorded? What does the All India Football Federation have to watch out for as it gets ready to hold the two tournaments in the coming months? We talked to news clicks Leslie Xavier to find out more. Thank you Leslie for joining us. So as we've seen the iLeague qualifiers have concluded, Mohammedin SC has qualified for the league. And this has been an interesting experiment because it's been done in an eco bubble. Like you mentioned earlier, it's one of the first major sporting events to happen in India. So we'll get into some of the more detailed aspects later, but first impressions regarding how the tournament was held in the context of this pandemic. What do you think? So it's a restart of sporting action that way in India and a major tournament as such because this was the qualifying tournament for the next season of the iLeague, which is supposed to start in November, but I guess they have moved it postponed it a little bit more because the logistics have to be figured out. So this was a pilot project in a way, a smaller tournament, two weeks, five matches to be exact, and five teams were involved and they were just playing each other once. So it was a single round Roman format and the team which ended up scoring the highest points once. So it in essence was a knockout tournament, straightforward shootout for the qualifying slot. And Mohammedin did well because they sealed the title in the third round itself after the three matches there's four nine points and an assailable lead. So in fact they are playing today, but that is a consequential match as such because they have already sealed the title. And as far as the club's performance is concerned, the Mohammedin was the most set team in the mix. We had Bangalore United, we had Garhwal FC from Delhi, we had RIFC which is from Ahmadabad and we also had Bhavani Khol FC which is from West Bengal. And the surprise package of the league was Bhavani Khol FC. The club, I know outside of the footballing fraternity, Bhavani Khol doesn't ring the bell just like some of the bigger clubs in Calcutta, like Mohan Bagan or East Bengal. But Bhavani Khol has been a regular fixture in the Calcutta league and they have a decent history, they have a long standing history in the game also. And it was happening to see them come out and though at the start of the tournament people had not given them much of a reckoning once the tournament started and they had decent forwarding players in their ranks who all came through well and they seemed to be a well gel side. And when Bhavani Khol and Mohan Bagan, sorry, Mohammedin's forwarding played each other on Saturday, it was virtually a final. The winner would have sealed the title. So two clubs were part of the Calcutta league, they played each other and of course Mohammedin had a stronger, larger team and they came through. Surprise, I mean another surprise or rather shock was seeing Bangalore United underperform. They were also a club which was, I mean initially before the tournament, they were supposed to give a run for, they were one of the front runners for the title for qualifying. But they just, the team never gelled together and also there were one of the two teams which had a COVID positive case among the players. Bangalore United had one player and Bhavani Khol FC had one player. So whether that offset the plan or whether it was just a sheer fact that the pandemic, in the pandemic situation teams, it was obvious never had a chance to train together. For example, a team like RIFC and or a team like even Garwal FC. So these are teams who I mean who couldn't not just get convened the players together, not just because of the pandemic but because of the finances involved also. These are teams that make ends meet on a season to season basis. So those teams, I mean considering all these factors, them getting together and then giving commendable performances on the pitch that was great to see. And also as journalists and as football fans, it was finally great to see some Indians playing sports. In this context, you mentioned the COVID-19 cases at the ECO. We know that the much bigger tournament, the ISL is also coming up soon. So with regard to the preparations, what do you see as the lessons that should be learned ideally from this experience? What was done right? Anything to look forward to? Like I said at the start itself, that this was a pilot for the football organizers in the country. The larger tournament being ISL as well as the ID, which happens to be the second tier tournament as things stand in the Indian football context. ISL is supposed to start in November. As of now, I mean the dates are not fixed, the fixtures are not fixed in, but the teams are all convened in Goa at the ECO bubbles. They're training together. We have in fact a couple of regulars of our show for 20 grand. Ishfar Karmal is attached with Kerala Blasters as an assistant coach. Renendee Singh, who is also one of the experts who comes for our show, assistant coach with East Bengal. They're both at the ECO bubbles training with the team. So training has started, but no foreigners are there in the mix yet because visa issues are there. So none of the players, foreign players or the foreign coaches have, I mean all the coaches in fact, because ISL teams are all coached by foreigners, the head coaches. So none of the head coaches are here. So they are all communicating virtually and getting things moving. So that is one reason why, with this uncertainty happening, that's one reason why the final calendar has not been finalized yet. But it's going to be a five-month long tournament and a competition. And the same with the I-League, it's going to be a long-run competition. So taking this idea of the ECO bubble, which was, I mean you can say experimental because all the factors that were put in, all the protocols put in were new for the teams involved. And then taking it into a larger plane there. And looking at how things were managed, I would say AFF did it, did amicably well. For a change, I'm not criticizing the Federation. But yeah, like for instance, I said two cases that came out just before the start of the tournament. They were isolated, they were asymptomatic cases and they were treated obviously. But then this happened after the teams had started training together once the quarantine period got over. So that's a tricky period because the players interacted with each other. So luckily then it didn't become a cluster spread as such and things were in control. And then of course on the pitch, yeah, there were instances where we thought that referees looked a little rusty, players themselves looked a little rusty, especially the opening pictures. But they all played well, they seemed decently fit given the circumstances. But there are a couple of things that, lessons that probably the ISL clubs can learn from the clubs that played here, ISL and ILE clubs. And one being how to manage the players within the system. Of course, like I keep saying, this was a smaller tournament. But the playing dynamics, the fitness of the players, how to prepare these players for the match, all these things remain the same. It's just that it's going to be a long-drawn affair at a larger tournament. So that is one lesson that these guys have in the other tournament clubs and officials can take away from. And the other much more important aspect that they should learn or they should understand how or why or what, how to manage exactly is the synergy of the team, the team's state of being and the team's unity. Because that's something that was not discussed so far. And then suddenly when the ILE qualifier happened, huge controversy erupted because the champions, Mohammedan Sporting, even though they had a smooth run of victories on the pitch, off the pitch, it was madness. Huge controversy erupted over there and the coach resigned or sacked depending on which people you believe left midway. And then the team went on to win the subsequent matches. That's probably the credit goes to the coach himself because he must have set the team right. But yeah, this controversy happened which could have been avoided but it was a nasty affair. I can explain that. Yes, actually that's something I was going to ask as well. You've written about it also, there was some controversy, the allegations of match, although it's a very short tournament, but nonetheless allegations of match fixing thrown around and this always kind of puts fans, the players themselves, everyone in a very bad state of mind. So could you just maybe take us through what exactly is likely to have happened in this scenario and again, what are the lessons that should be learned from this? So the main two characters, main three characters rather in this, in this whole episode is Mohammedan Sporting Management, Jan Loh the former coach, now former coach and Ranjit Bajaj, who is the owner of Minerva Academy Football Academy, formerly Minerva Punjab FC owner. And Bajaj is quite a character, anything controversial in Indian football, anything to beat, anything, I mean he is there. So Bajaj happened to be staying at the, it is I think Hyatt in Calcutta, he happened to be staying at the same Hiko Purple Hotel as the Mohammedan Sporting team was playing. And Jan Loh being formerly from Punjab FC, I mean Minerva Punjab, so he has friendship, he has connections with Ranjit Bajaj probably. And suddenly after the first match there was rumour mill, rumours doing the round, what's our forwards doing the round that Jan Loh has been discussing match dynamics, the team dynamics with Ranjit Bajaj giving him information on the playing 11. And it amounts to match fixing in a way because you are giving out valuable information to a third party, to an outsider. So that's a huge allegation and of course any coach wouldn't want to be linked with I mean alleged match fixing, even if it's not proven that to mid tournament. And so he came out, he said I'm resigning. And then the entire episode went into, I mean went into Nazteef by the club management trying to justify their side of things by saying that match fixing one. Second thing is that Jan Loh was deciding team composition on his own without discussing the team management or team management's inputs were not taken seriously by the coach. So I mean let's just be very clear in footballing terms the coach has a final say as far as which players play. He decides the formation, he decides the idea of or the philosophy of playing. So Jan Loh was very much in his own rights to decide what is playing 11 is. So management getting involved in it, that's unprofessional to say the least. And so anyway, so that was the allegation then Ranjit Bajaj came out, I mean petting a different information case of his own. Police cases have been filed, some WhatsApp message leaks have happened. So it's entirely a mess. So then the key year in my piece which I addressed last week was the All India Football Federation whose tournament it is, they were silent about it the entire time. We contacted a couple of officials, senior officials as such who are involved in the action. They said we were not involved because it's an internal affair, club internal affair. But it's not because match fixing allegation is involved here. So either the AFF of All India Football Federation should have stepped in and made the club realize that this is not then if you have a domestic issue within the club, you should deal it in a professional way, not by flowing around words like match fixing if at all it's not happened. And secondly, they should have also launched an investigation of their own and brought out their own version or at least really saying that we are on top of this and we are investigating what exactly happened. But they were silent altogether. So that was the point that I addressed in that piece. But the larger picture that I wanted to provide which is a takeaway from this tournament for the ISL or the ILEE clubs is that this is a real situation within the eco bubble that could happen to any club. So we are talking about say arbitrary system in arbitrary case, ISL club, of course the club owners won't all the management or the senior management of the club won't be there in the eco bubble. They're all businessmen, business owners, they would be staying out and keeping a tab of things, they would have a representative in the eco bubble. And then we have players and the player management and the support staff. And so the owner or the board of directors or the main controllers of the club, the business side of business wing of the club, they would obviously be dependent on their representation to give information as to what is happening. They would have their inputs, they would get back their information. And it's a break of, I mean, and which can easily happen. I believe that this is what happened in Calcutta as well in the case of Mother's 14. A break of information and then misinformation and then someone deciding to believe someone's story, someone's version and then suddenly something's were said, something's came out and then it just escalated beyond. So to maintaining the team spirit, so to speak, if at all spirit is a tangible value to be used here, but it is because the balance of the team, the happiness of the team, it's five months you're talking about. And in our previous stats, we have discussed how it can be a tremendous toll on the players, on the coaches because pressure of winning, losing, pressure of being away, isolated, pressure of just, I mean, too much of football also is a problem like there's life beyond that also where the players can relax and then come back and play. So that is not going to happen this time around. So anyways, the players and the management and all the people involved in gameplay are stretched beyond limit, I mean, stretched to unprecedented limits, I would say, because these are things that they are not used to, they are not prepared for it. So they will learn as they go and obviously tempers might flare, obviously there will be some decisions which may not go well and then so if information flow is not managed properly, then this episode can play out in any of the clubs. So this is a serious lesson which everyone including the All India Football Federation should take cognizance of and should plan or should keep in mind when they're dealing with all the dynamics that is happening within the ISL eco bubble. And last and final takeaway I would say is just also ensure that on the pitch everything goes fair which is again one aspect of it is ensuring that no element of corruption or even shadow of corruption comes onto the league because that is something that is the last thing that you want in a pandemic situation where you are organizing sport as a restart and so it's bad for the sport, it brings the entire sport to dispute. So I'm just hoping that the AFRF and the authorities and the FSBL which runs the ISL, they are all, I mean, looked at this mini tournament that happened and understands this aspect also and probably be more hyperactive about instances such as these and ensure that it's nipped in the bud so that it doesn't bring the entire competition and the game itself into dispute. Thank you so much, Nessie. We will be tracking these tournaments as they have been discussing this. Thank you so much. That's all we have time for today. We'll be back tomorrow with more news from the world and the country. Until then, keep watching NewsClick.