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Journalism of Courage
The All-India Football Federation (AIFF) has shortlisted four foreign coaches as the process to select the India coach reached its home stretch today. The names drawn up by the AIFF, following the Technical Committee’s suggestions, are Englishmen Bob Houghton, Ian Porterfield, Dutchman Clemence Westorhof and Irishman Brian Kerr.
The AIFF has set the interviews for May 24 and 25 and the coaches have been asked to appear before the technical committee. It may be recalled that the AIFF had sent the names of 11 coaches to the technical committee to shortlist the best five.
The technical committee members, which include chairman C R Viswanathan, Pradip Chowdhury, Mohammed Habeeb, Inder Singh and Henry Menezes sent their top-five choices from among the 11 sent to them by the AIFF.
The four coaches shortlisted by the AIFF were the common names in all the lists, it is learnt. The selected coaches boast of impressive CVs. Kerr was in charge of Ireland till they failed to make it to the 2006 World Cup. Porterfield is a former Chelsea manager and Dutch coach, Westorhof has managed teams like PSV Eindhoven and Ajax apart from Netherlands’ Under-21 side. The 63-year-old Dutch tactician also guided Nigeria to the 1994 World Cup.
Porterfield has to his credit an FA Cup victory with Sheffield United. Other than coaching Chelsea from 1991 to 1993, he also coached Bolton Wanderers and the national teams of Zambia, Oman and Trinidad and Tobago. Englishman Bob Houghton, who took Swedish side Malmo to the Champions Cup Final in 1978-79 also has the distinction of taking China to the World Cup finals in 2002. Among the various aspects that the technical committee members looked into were the coaches’ experience of coaching in the sub-continent, their familiarity with working in non-professional set-ups, their proficiency with the English language.
