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Eye on india Bhutia & Co look to toughen up

Every winter, Dubai becomes the favourite destination for some of the top flight clubs of Europe for a welcome break. A few days of sunshine, light training sessions - and more importantly no media intrusion - all this makes this buzzing emirate so sought after for the likes of a Portsmouth or Bayern Munich.

  • By Gautam Bhattacharyya, Deputy Sports Editor
  • Published: 22:48 July 2, 2009
  • Gulf News

Every winter, Dubai becomes the favourite destination for some of the top flight clubs of Europe for a welcome break. A few days of sunshine, light training sessions - and more importantly no media intrusion - all this makes this buzzing emirate so sought after for the likes of a Portsmouth or Bayern Munich.

Over the last couple of years, they have a new addition to the club - the Indian football team.

For Baichung Bhutia & Co, there is no place quite like Dubai - be it in transit for World Cup qualifiers or preparation for any international event at hand. This time, they are here on their way to a training camp in Barcelona before they defend their Nehru Cup title in August.

The reasons behind their falling for the emirate, as articulated by both coach Bob Houghton and Bhutia, are much different from the glamour clubs though.

For Bhutia, who has become the face of Indian football for quite sometime now, it makes great sense to come here for "it's both closer to home as well as the training facilities are great."

Not so long back, the spartan campuses of Sports Authority of India used to be the hub of activity for such teams in training - but such arrangements look almost medieval in these days of specialised training and facilities.

It may sound like an exaggeration when Houghton says there is no place to train in India barring Goa (and it's raining there), but then he knows best.

Making a case for the lack of practice facilities back home, Houghton pointed out that Churchill Brothers - who won the last National League - did not have an assistant coach, fitness coach, goalkeeping coach, nor a regular physio or a doctor while a practice ground is a far cry.

Speaking from experience, it's no different in Bengal - which boasts of two century-old clubs in Mohun Bagan and East Bengal with an tremendous fan base.

And still, we don't let go any opportunity to ridicule the Indian football team - rattling out numbers as to where they are in Fifa rankings or how far they have slid in Asia itself despite winning the football gold in the Asiad in the Sixties.

This bunch, however, has given us enough to dream over the last few years - and they certainly deserve a hearty send-off from us!

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