Imaging by Santnu Mallick

It is a different ball game that’s being played in boardrooms across the country as corporate honchos dribble past one another in the race to get on the football field. Yes, football is fast becoming hot property for Indian companies which are rushing to get in the game in a bid to raise their profiles. And money — at long last — is coming onto the field.

So, in January, when Panasonic announced its partnership with the All India Football Federation (AIFF), it didn’t come as a big surprise. The global technology giant signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the AIFF to “build up passion for the game amongst the youth”.

The investment? A whopping $1 million for the national team each year for the next three years. “Though football has the second largest fan base in the country, it has not been promoted as much. We want to spend more money and energy to promote the game across India,” says Sabiha Kidwai, general manager, brand building, Panasonic. Panasonic’s money is slated to be spent on training programmes for footballers, better kits and also to enable the hiring of better coaches.

And this is not all. The AIFF has also sealed a deal with sportswear brand Nike who are now the official apparel sponsors for the various national teams in all age groups.

Even junior-level tournaments, for which the AIFF spends minimal amounts, have also aroused the interest of some companies. So now there’s Coca Cola which has been sponsoring the Mir Iqbal Hussain Trophy (Sub- Junior National Championship) since the 2008-09 football season.

Coca Cola sent 16 U-16 players to Brazil for training in 2008 and plans to send more to the Coca Cola Football Academy in Johannesburg, South Africa

So why are companies suddenly looking at football with greater interest? One obvious reason is that footballing standards have been rising in recent years and the national team has been performing better. “The game in the country is improving in leaps and bounds, so it’s only natural that companies should look at football positively. It will help not only to bring the much needed funds to the game, but also help to build a proper atmosphere for soccer in the country,” says Bhaichung Bhutia, captain of the Indian team.

Also, the AIFF is making efforts to bring more companies into football. “Praful Patel, the president (AIFF), has singlehandedly helped to bring in close to Rs 40 crore to the AIFF coffers in less than 12 months,” says Subrata Dutta, vice president, AIFF.

The money is coming in at all levels. Coca Cola, for instance, is supporting the juniors. “Since there is a lot of activity happening at the senior level in football, we wanted to create a pipeline from the junior level. We spoke to a lot of coaches and other experts who felt it would be good to start with the juniors,” says a Coca Cola India spokesman.

The ball began rolling around the time the National Football League, NFL, (now re-christened the I-League) started 13 years ago. The commercialisation process started accelerating four years after that when the TV rights for the NFL were sold to Zee Sports for an astounding Rs 274 crore for a period of 10 years. After that offers slowly started coming in with the likes of ONGC, Hero Honda, Coca Cola entering the scene.

Panasonic has plans to sponsor the national U-19 team

And over the last few years, there has been no looking back. The top guys are making a beeline for sponsorships and other deals, and some are even starting their own clubs. Even the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) is pumping in Rs 25 crore for youth development programmes for two years. And the older players like UB, ONGC and Mahindra & Mahindra are putting in more resources and expanding their field.

Take ONGC for instance. The corporation started in 2004 by putting in Rs 7 crore as the sponsors of NFL. So far, they have spent Rs 30 crore on the game. Besides the I-League, the company has also sponsored the Nehru Cup for the last two years, which was won by India on both occasions. ONGC has also been supporting 25 children from the Mizoram Football Academy and will be spending Rs 75,000 per kid for a period of three years.

“We want the old glorious days of Indian football to come back. So we are trying to improve the standards of the game in the country. The competitive flavour provided by the I-League has helped the Indian team achieve good results in recent times,” says Bibek Bhowmik, in-charge & games co-ordinator, football, ONGC.

Apart from sponsoring the Kingfisher Goa Premier League, the UB Group is also putting money behind Lajong FC, Shillong

The UB Group, which started with a bang when they began sponsoring Calcutta giants Mohun Bagan and East Bengal, is also slowly looking beyond Bengal. So they now sponsor the Kingfisher Goa Premier League, the Goa state football team, and have also put in money behind the rising star, Lajong FC, Shillong.

“Our investments in football are in line with our overall brand and business strategy, keeping in mind the growing interest in the sport in our country. The returns have been satisfactory from the point of view of brand association, brand recall and leveraging of marketing activation,” says Samar S. Sheikhawat, senior vice president, marketing, United Breweries.

“The coming of corporate houses will help football in India. But we will have to make our grassroots strong and promote our players so that they can help popularise football. However, the state associations should also get corporate support,” says Ankur Datta, vice president, AIFF. “Also, the performance in the Asia Cup 2011 is also very important,” he says.

The advent of the big corporations has even got the AIFF thinking about restarting the U-19 football league that was stopped few years back. “The scenario is very bright. Every day some company or the other is meeting Praful Patel or Alberto Colaco (general secretary, AIFF) to get associated with football,” says a federation insider.

Tata Steel has been running the very successful Tata Football Academy in Jamshedpur since 1989

Mahindra & Mahindra, which runs the football club Mahindra United, has also been putting in larger amounts of money into the game. So their annual expenditure has gone up from Rs 4 crore to Rs 5 crore to Rs 8 crore to Rs 10 crore over the last few years. This apart, they have now started training schoolboys in Mumbai. So the coaches go to schools like St Andrews and Don Bosco to train the kids there in football. “Initially we were into a lot of other sports also like hockey, tennis, golf and kabaddi. But we pulled out to concentrate on football because we thought it is a game which is hardy and rough like our products,” says Alan Durante, chairman, Mahindra United.

Tata Steel, which has been running the very successful Tata Football Academy (TFA) in Jamshedpur since 1989, has recently opened feeder centres in places like Jamdoba (Bihar), Normundy (Jharkhand) and Joda (Orissa). “The objective is to get rural children to playing football. Some of them might even get into TFA on merit,” says Satish Pillai, chief, corporate sustainability services, Tata Steel.

The initial aim of the company was to provide a structured opportunity for children to get into sports. The academy takes in 35-40 boys every year and all expenditure — including training, kit, education, food, lodging and even programmes on etiquette and personality development, and a stipend — is taken care of by the company. “We even provide for tuition teachers,” says Pillai. There are three coaches for the academy and there are foreign coaches to assist when they are touring abroad. The team is sent for one foreign trip every alternate year.

Nike is the official apparel sponsor for the various national football teams in all age groups

Coca Cola, too, has been sending footballers for training abroad. So the top 16 players of the Mir Iqbal Hussain Trophy will be sent to South Africa in June where they will be training at the Coca Cola Football Academy in Johannesburg. In 2008, the company sent 16 U-16 players to Brazil for training. “We had initially organised a junior level meet and then we realised that there was already a platform in the form of the Mir Iqbal Hussain Trophy,” says a Coca Cola India spokesperson.

And this is not all. Nirmal Lifestyle has set up an academy in Mumbai — for which the cost of land and infrastructure will be borne by them — with technical assistance from the AIFF and Panasonic plans to get into the U-19 level and sponsor the team. “We might also go into the interior areas to encourage under-privileged children to play football,” says Kidwai.

Money is clearly being pumped in but how is it being spent? A lot is going on the four national teams — U-16, U-19, U-23 and senior. Some cash is being used to pay the salary of the foreign coaches (Bob Houghton and Colin Toll), organising the various meets across India and national camps and exposure tours. And yes, since the AIFF has become a professional organisation now, quite a bit goes into salaries for the marketing and administration divisions.

The budget of the Federation has gone up from Rs 20 crore (last year) to Rs 55 crore this year. But a lot is left to be done, feel people associated with the game. Infrastructure development is foremost. That’s the reason why the AIFF, at its last executive committee meeting, decided that it needed two stadiums for international matches which it will either build or acquire.

“If football in India has to thrive, then much has to be done to improve infrastructure and for that the commercialisation process has to be accelerated,” says Subrata Dutta.

“The thrust should be towards infrastructure — better stadiums, stands, TV coverage and even lighting,” says Durante of Mahindra United.

The visible face of the rising popularity of the game is Salman Khan — the actor has agreed to become brand ambassador for the game in India. In fact, the growth in popularity of the sport has ensured that the number of teams in the Nike Manchester United Premier Cup, that the company conducts in association with the AIFF, has seen a growth in the number of teams from eight (when the meet started five years back) to 65 this year from different parts of the country.

Companies are also doing their bit to increase awareness about the game and spread it. So even Sony PIX acquired the telecast rights for the FA Cup and held screenings of the live final match in Mumbai, Bangalore, Calcutta and Hyderabad. “We held the screenings at sports bars or at the press clubs where people guessed the winner of the match and won PlayStations,” says Sunder Aaron, business head, Sony PIX.

Panasonic plans to increase branding and the visibility of national team. “We will be promoting the players through advertisements,” says Kidwai.

The challenges remain. Sponsors know that it will take time for the national team to reach up to the international level, but hopes are high. In the meantime, Indian football only stands to benefit.