Sri Lanka football: No goals to show!

This is the fourth article in the Daily FT’s fortnightly series titled Business of Sports focusing on the back office of the various sports administered and played in this country. Readers are invited to share their views and express their opinion via email to [email protected] on the features carried in this column so that a greater public participation in sports matters can surface and be debated for the benefit of all

Recent media reports both in Sri Lanka and the international press concerning football have raised many questions with the public at large none the wiser about the machinations taking place off the field.

The cameos of the sport enacted on the wide screens are what captures the imagination and adds to the multitude of fans constantly garnered by the world’s most popular sport. However, not all the virtuosity of a Messi can dispel the sad travesty that the game has come to experience from the apex bodies of both FIFA and AFC in the context of the plight Sri Lanka faces today.

Asian soccer Supremo Bin Hamman has just lost his appeal and seems confined to the quagmire of history. While Blatter seems to prevail for the time being, both FIFA and AFC must share the blame for the morass that has befallen Sri Lanka Football.

No renaissance

All the grants and heady favours granted to the FFSL have not brought about the renaissance one would have dearly wished for. Instead, only a few have benefited from the largesse, with the Sri Lanka footballer the poorer for it. Regrettably, no supervision of the generous handouts to improve the game in the country has effectively taken place and a colossal resource has somehow gone to seed.

Once an effervescent sport in the country with great names of yesteryear donning the Sri Lanka jersey to face the might of visiting teams, today its National Team appears bedraggled and apathetic when they come on the pitch and more often than not, lose to the minions of South Asia, earning a current FIFA ranking of 169, probably a decadency unparalleled in its long history.

Sri Lanka flounders

So what is the problem facing Sri Lanka Football when at least two of its neighbours, India and the Maldives, have got their acts together and are slowly but surely coming into reckoning as top Asian teams? They are not there yet, but the direction is clear and certain. Sri Lanka on the other hand is floundering at every turn with an absolute lack of direction.

Knowledgeable sources speak of a short term emphasis to sneak through the next championship when the main failure they point out is structural, something that has eroded over the last several years.

Today, the edifice appears impressive and well-equipped, offering a deceptive facade for the shortcomings within. Football does not come under the radar on a daily basis unlike most of Sri Lanka’s premier sports, simply because it does not deserve mention. When it does on and off, it is for the wrong reasons.

Straddled by a colossus

Everyone in Sri Lanka knows that football is straddled by a colossus in Manilal Fernando who is a FIFA Executive Committee Member. Fernando has presided over Sri Lanka Football for over three decades, during which time it has experienced vast changes, notably in the development of its infrastructure, though not necessarily for the better.

Fernando is a consummate operator and his ascent to the rarefied FIFA strongholds should not be underestimated. That he could defeat candidates from Japan and China to this coveted position speaks realms of his wide acceptance in Asian soccer circles. So it may be interesting to ask the question as to how a lowly soccer nation can produce a soccer giant off the pitch but cannot provide that measure of respectability to its own national teams.

This is the trauma that the World Football Body has created with a mafia like grouping controlling its regional interests in a web so strong and tight knit that constant manoeuvring is needed to remain among the favoured.

Fernando is a genial man and even his harshest critics will acknowledge his passion and commitment to the game. The fact that it has not translated into positive results is a paradox, partly explained by the need to retain the power required to remain at the helm in order to reign at the top.

Anyone who knows how FIFA and AFC operates will tell you that the game travels first class wherever it goes and opens doors that are not accessible to those not in the corridors of influence and power.

Life Presidency

Take a closer look at the Sports Law of Sri Lanka. The President of a Sports Body can hold office only for two consecutive terms. Manilal Fernando has done that and more. Following his Presidency, Fernando with the support of the FFSL Ex-Co and Council secured a new role for himself as Chairman of the Management Committee. This is akin to a Life Presidency and why not?

Given his growing stature in the commercial world and his influential role in AFC, the rank and file of the FFSL bequeathed to him the fortunes of the Controlling Body and the rest as they say, is history.

Critics claim that every position in the FFSL must be endorsed by Fernando. They elaborate that without his nod no one gets to adorn any rank in the Ex-Co. Year after year, in a beautifully orchestrated succession, the President, Secretary and Treasurer are elected but remain just figureheads. They are simply happy for a brief place in the sun. Meanwhile, the Federation runs on the direct control of a fully-fledged organisational team lead by a CEO who reports to the Chairman of the Management Committee.

Mismanagement and incompetence

The model could have worked but it has not. And one simple reason critics offer is mismanagement and incompetence. Current President, MP Sarath Weerasekara, could well be the exception.

A reputed footballer in his day and a decorated naval officer before taking to politics, the incumbent President it is said, works closely with Fernando to transform Sri Lanka Football. Whether it is too little too late or if recent events related to the FIFA fiascos will affect Sri Lanka is left to be seen.

It is common knowledge that Fernando was a close confidant of Bin Hamman and it will take all his guile to steer clear of the fall out that is bound to take place in the acrimonious world of football!

Hashimdeen, a former Sri Lanka Captain, has regularly resorted to a friendly press to blow the whistle on what he sees is a point of no return. He claims that the League Structure has been steadily subverted and that schools’ football has been thoroughly neglected, something the FFSL refutes vehemently.

Abject poverty

Regrettably, for whatever reason, football has dramatically lost its popularity. It is referred to as the poor man’s game but it is now in a condition of abject poverty. If one considers the immense work done by Fernando and his loyalists in building several sports complexes and providing gainful employment to many within the FFSL network, then the lack of funds cannot be a lament.

Fernando has made possible lucrative FIFA & AFC appointments for those who have played and served the game, and made sure that his starting eleven were always well taken care of. Thus it is pretty obvious that it has not been funds alone that has brought the game to its knees but a combination of factors some inadvertent but much determined in the hallowed sanctums of Football House.

Benevolence has been a key Fernando attribute and with that has also come two fortunate principal sponsorships that the FFSL has enjoyed over the last few years. One of course is easy to understand with Holcim cementing a strong and sustained support while Dialog has also reciprocated the initial good will shown by FFSL by sticking to its partner through both good and bad times.

Along with a few other subsidiary sponsors, the FFSL has managed to steer its overburdened ship, but the benefits sadly have not reached the clubs or players. In today’s context it is the service clubs that prosper fuelled by intra rivalry among its teams. The other clubs rely heavily on individual diehard owners who barely manage to survive. The old soccer maestro Sirisena and the Saunders Club are just one such institution.

Technical aspects

One area that the FFSL has performed very poorly is in the technical aspects of the sport. Constant infighting and a myopic understanding of the value of technical development has resulted in a huge vacuum in this area of expertise with all FIFA & AFC training programmes not translating into good results.

The National Team is in the hands of a Korean Coach but there is no strong feeder and technical support to nurture teams for international competition. Anyone with an iota of sports management knows that in today’s sophisticated arena, technical excellence is fundamental and intention alone, however genuine, cannot realise its full potential without an enlightened and highly disciplined technical group.

The other parallel requisite is good playing facilities. The FFSL with all its sport complexes does not have an accepted international venue with the City League grounds barely meeting its local commitments. This is where the Government led by the Ministry of Sports should provide redress by assigning a stadium like the Sugathadasa to the FFSL so that they can leverage its extensive facilities.

Milinda Moragoda has in his Mayoral Manifesto, as he has done in the past, made reference to the football playgrounds that festooned the City of Colombo. Urban development took away these grounds from the city footballers, who it can be claimed were the cradle of the sport.

Need a goal soon

With cricket and rugby in particular drawing youth away, the lure of football is difficult to come by unless a new paradigm is unleashed soon, something no doubt Fernando quietly ponders!

Football is arguably the world’s most valued game with the superstars attracting astronomical pay checks and benefits. So it is not a doom scenario but one that demands imagination and a will to leave the past behind and put the house in order fast. Sri Lanka Football needs a few goals soon before it is too late!