Indian Resurgence

[Pundit]

Wow, India really is in the final of a serious ODI tournament. Never a big supporter of the team because of their mental weakness, I am nevertheless very happy that they are accomplishing something for the first time since 1985.

[Mahmood]

This is their 2nd in a row final appearence in this tournament.

India has one of the best batting line up in current cricket. In ODI, batting alone can win you a game. So, when India's batting clicks, they are unbeatable. Remember the 300+ run chase win they had in last serise in England.

[Pundit]

[Orpheus]

How the hell does India win against Bangladesh in Football?? It's not a by chance win - a thrashing win. Shouldn't Bangladesh be the best in sub-continent +those saaf games countries in football??

India is going up at every event and Bangladesh DOWN...SAD

Bangladesh defeated India in shooting but that was a Lucky shot - not a deserved one....Win is a win anyhow!!! So that can be let go...

[Tehsin]

The Indian team has been practicing seriously for the last couple of months. They have BAICHUNG BHUTIA (remember that name because you will hear it from time to time). They recently won a six nation tournament in Vietnam. They defeated Uzbekistan 2-0 in a friendly. The Uzbek's are one the best in ASIA.

Compared to that, Kottan (our coach) seems to be the only BFF official (he is employed by BFF) who even cared to get the team together. However, his repeated request to hand the players over to him and get some warm-up matches lined up were IGNORED by BFF and the CLUBS. He finally got the team only 15 days ago and only played one friendly match (Against the number three team in Thailand). I don't blame the players and by the way, we lost to teams like Vietnam 4-0 only few months ago so losing 0-3 to an emerging team like India is nothing. They care enough about their own country, we don't.

[Tehsin]

I am surprised by Badal's comment (Badal played for Bangladesh and Mohammedan mostly thru his career and now acting as the assistent General secratary of BFF). You don't usually see our officials to come out and make such MATURE comments:

Who's to blame?
Sports Reporter

Bangladesh's 0-3 defeat against India in the 14th Asian Games on Friday might have shocked the football buffs but observers felt the result was always on the cards.
Bangladesh's performance in the 25-nation tournament was written on the wall ever since the BFF (Bangladesh Football Federation) decided to send the team without a single day's preparations, many observed.

When other countries including India had a few months' training for the Asiad, Bangladesh booters were busy playing in the Premier League where most of the matches were alleged to be fixed.

The Korea-bound footballers met each other for the first time on the morning of September 20 when they were heading for the airport.

"The team and its coach have nothing to do with this result because it was our fault. We have sent the team without any preparation. None but BFF should be blamed for this," said BFF assistant general secretary Badal Roy yesterday.

"I don't find any reason to blame the coach because he has hardly anything to do with our plan for no practice. The boys also should not be blamed because we could not arrange any camp for them. It's totally our failure," he said.

National coach George Kottan appealed to the BFF to let him start the camp from August 28 and then go to Thailand to play at least a quartet of practice matches before going to Busan.

But it were two leading clubs Abahani and Mohammedan Sporting Club who opposed the idea of suspending the Premier League, which ended the day before the team left the capital.

Former national footballer and Muktijoddha Sangsad coach Shafiqul Islam Manik however neither blamed the coach nor the BFF for Bangladesh's worst result against India.

"You can not blame the coach because he has already said he can't produce any miracle without any preparation. Again you can not condemn the BFF because the club organisers are running the league," Manik said yesterday.

"The clubs should be held responsible for this debacle as they placed their club interests above the country's.

"I would not mind if we conceded three goals against China. But it is hard to accept when we come up with such result against India who have the same playing standard," said Manik, adding that sending the Team without any training was a sheer stupidity.

Kottan, the Austro-Hungarian coach, said prior to the team's departure that he had never been into such a weird circumstance before.

"I have never been in such an awkward position in my whole coaching career. There was no camp, not enough practice matches and again we are going for the biggest competition of Asia.

"Naturally, I don't have any aim in this Games and neither anybody should expect anything since you know that we are going without a single day's practice," said Kottan before the team flew off to Bangkok last week.

Rallying behind the coach, Manik said, "He (Kottan) was right in his demand and BFF should have listened to him. Now it would haunt us for many years that we lost to India 0-3."
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What I am afraid of is that Kottan (who showed cares more about our soccer than the clubs or BFF) is going to leave as soon as he gets a good deal. I think two of the other saaf nations have already shown interest in him.

[Pundit]

Not only that, hasn't Bhutiya played for Arsenal - Ok Arnab, don't let the first syllabal excite you a tad bit too much - no, just kiddin'

With my intermittent acquaintance to Bangladeshi sports officials over the past 20 years, man, people from this country have the worst foresight in the history of the Modern world. Coupled with that, the bloodiest backstabbing habit existing anywhere.

Sorry to say that.

[Tehsin]

The paper says that he played for second division side Bury.