The deal will include investments of Rs. 700 crore (US$ 70 million). This is one of the biggest deals seen in Indian football. A agreement includes promotion, broadcasting and infrastructure development for world class facilities at the grass root level in India.

AIFF’s existing partner Zee Sports, still have five of the ten year contract remaining. However, IMG-RIL had given a buyout amount of Rs 70 crore (US$ 7 million) for Zee to exit before the agreement expiry.

Praful Patel, president of the AIFF said:

“We felt the need that Indian football requires a much stronger partner that can invest a lot in the development of football in India. Our cooperation with Zee has been really fruitful but somewhere it could not fulfill what we desired. With IMG-RIL coming into the picture, I am confident we will witness real development of football in India”.

Serbia’s Dragan Mrdja scored two goals. The Serbs looked more up for the game as compared to their Japanese counterparts. Japan captain Yuji Nakazawa told Reuters:

“We did exactly what we knew we couldn’t afford to by conceding an early goal. We know we’re going to face even more dangerous players at the World Cup in June. We just have to take this loss on the chin and move forwards.”

While the Serbian assistant coach was quoted saying:

“There was plenty of quality tonight for Antic to consider when he chooses his World Cup squad. The players showed they will soon be competing for places with the senior players.”

The display put up by the Japanese players does little to suggest that they can reach anywhere close to their semi-final target, set by coach Takeshi Okada, for the World Cup 2010.

Okada said:

“I honestly thought we would be better than that. There wasn’t the motivation there should be when you wear the Japan shirt. For that I apologise. We had 70 percent of the possession but did nothing with it. It has underlined how reliant we are on our top players.”

Serbia showed solid defence as well as threatening in attack. Goalkeeper Zeljko Brkic made an marvellous fingertip save from Shinji Okazaki with the score at 1-0.

Japan have their task cut out for them, they have been drawn alongside Netherlands, Denmark and Cameroon in Group E, for the World Cup.

Venezuela haven’t qualified for the Cup, but Japan manager Takeshi Okada feels it would be a good test as “teams from South America always approach matches wanting to win”. and also added that the game “will help toughen Japan up”.

Japanese players celebrate their goal

Right now Japan have no more friendlies in store, however, they will face China, Hong Kong and South Korea at the East Asian Championships in February.

Japan’s Asian counterparts- South Korea have left an option open to include veteran striker Ahn Jung-Hwan in next year’s World Cup.

Coach Huh has also stated that another veteran from the 2002 World Cup, Lee Chun-Soo may also get a chance. Huh said:

“Ahn Jung-Hwan and Lee Chun-Soo will not be ignore. They have much experience between them. The players are special assets to Korean football. They’re players who can adjust and do their share of work even if they are called upon later. They are still on the reserve list.”

Ahn, is famous for scoring a golden goal against Italy at the 2002 World Cup. Lee, also a key part of that South Korean team, currently plays his club football at Al-Nassr in Saudi Arabia.

The young Indian squad beat Bangladesh 1-0 on Friday, thanks to skipper Sushil Kumar Singh’s goal, scored in the 63rd minute. India started the game well and created a lot of chances, the earliest being in the second minute.

The Bangladeshi’s got their act together in the second half and added pressure on the Indian defense. But were unable to deal the final blow.  The home supporters were getting highly frustrated and started throwing bottles at the Indians.

India now face Maldives in the final, which is a repeat of last year. India managed to win the trophy, but Maldives are in devastating form beating Sri Lanka 5-1 in the second semi-final.

India managed to win over an in-form Nepali team. The Indian team just needed to win another match to qualify to the last four.  Whereas Nepal needed to win to stay alive in the tournament.

The Indian team performance was similar to the one against Afghanistan, where they couldn’t put together decent passes, but of course both teams were struggling in the start.

The only goal of the match came when  Robert Lalthamuana took a  free kick, but it was too close to the keeper. However, the Nepali defender Malla mistimed his jump and guided the ball into his own net, giving India the lead.

The Nepalese increase their attacks but like Afghanistan couldn’t get their finishing in place and were quite unlucky in some attacks.

The game went into a hibernating state as both teams struggled to make any clear opportunity to score. Nepal had most of the possession but still did not manage shots on target. Indians on the other hand already seemed content defending the lead rather than go for a second. Making a positive move though, Sukhwinder Singh brought on Jeje, the man who scored the winner against Afghanistan.

The Nepali’s played really well, stringing some beautiful attacks but didn’t manage to break the young Indian defense.

India U-23 took on Afghanistan in the South Asian Football Federation (SAFF) Championship at the BangaBandhu National Stadium, Dhaka, Bangladesh.

India have won the tournament 4 times already and are favourites this time round as well, but are fielding their U-23 squad this year.

India hadn’t created as many chances as Afghanistan in their opening game of this year’s tournament. Both teams ended on 0-0 at half time and were struggling to keep the ball.

Afghanistan put together better chances as compared to India, in the second half. The Afghani’s looked strong contenders to upset India.

Skipper Sushil missed some really good opportunities to put India ahead. The passing by the Indian squad got better as the game progressed but were physically less capable than their Afghani counterparts.

Je Je came to the rescue for India, scoring in the 85th minute. The 18-year-old, Pune FC player came on as a substitute and made a world of difference for India in their attack.

Afghanistan will be mortified with themselves, they played really well and could have easily won the game, or at least deserved a draw. But they were not able to convert their opportunites. Afghanistan had a penalty shout early in the match but the referee didn’t agree to their appeals. Later in added time, the Afghani’s had another decent opportunity but were unable to finish the job off.

The Indian youngsters have shown they have the ability, but we’ll have to wait and see how they perform against the tournament favourites, Maldives, in their match coming up on December 7th, 2009.

Al Ittihad had a string of chances in the first half but didn’t manage to take the lead. The Steelers weren’t able to match Al Ittihad in the first 45.

However, after the break the South Korean Club started playing much better and took the lead through Byung-Jun’s free-kick in the 57th minute. They added another from a set piece, Kim Hyung-Il headed home from a free-kick.

Al Ittihad pulled one back in the 74th when skipper Mohammed Noor netted the ball in. The Koreans kept trying to add to the lead but missed a few chances. In added time Al Ittihad had at least 3 takes at a free-kick; two Pohang players were booked for charging towards the ball during the free-kick, but the 3 takes also didn’t help Al Ittihad to equalize.

Climax Lawrence saved Dempo from a defeat by scoring in stoppage time. A 10-men Mahindra United looked set to get all three points, until the final “Climax”.

Mahindra were brought down to 10 when defender D Ravanan for elbowing a Dempo player, just 33 minutes into the match.

Although Dempo took the lead in the 11th minute and had many chances of extending the lead, Mahindra United made a fiery start to the second half and finally broke down the Dempo defence through Serbian midfielder Svetozmar Mijin. Minutes later Steven Dias gave Mahindra the lead and managed to keep Dempo at bay.

However, Dempo earned an equalizer late in the match when Climax headed in the ball in the 93rd minute.

JCT 1-1 Churchill Brothers

It was a similar story for another Goan club, Churchill Brothers, who sought a goal to finish with a point and finally got it in the 88th minute from Reisangmei Vashum. Both sides fought hard to get the better of each other. JCT broke the deadlock in the 66th minute with Baljit Singh Sahni scoring.

Churchill never gave up and their hard work paid off when substitute Charan Rai’s shot deflected off Vashum into the net.

Suboroto Paul

Subroto Paul is named the ‘Player of the Year’ by the AIFF. The Indian goal keeper has had a spectacular season, he also helped India retain the Nehru Cup by saving 3 penalties.

Derrick Pereira, his Pune FC coach was delighted by the news and has tipped him to be the next captain of the Indian Football team.

According to Goal.com Pereira said-

“Absolutely. He can definitely captain the Indian side. He is a team player, and I have seen no negatives in him so far. If he keeps up his performances, which I’m sure he will, he will have a great future”

Bollywood actress Shilpa Shetty  along with her boyfriend Raj Kundra entered the All India Football Federation (AIFF), showing an interest in Indian football.

The duo who own the IPL team, Rajasthan Royals, spent some time at the AIFF headquarters with general secretary Alberto Colaco. He was kept busy answering questions. Colaco said-

“It was a casual meeting. Shilpa and Raj were quite enthusiastic about Indian football and wanted to know about various development projects, our competitions and the general football structure. The meeting went off quite well.”

Both Shilpa and Raj are keen followers of the game and are nursing an idea of raising a top level team for domestic competitions.

Earlier Bollywood actor Salman Khan was roped in as the brand ambassador of Indian football by the AIFF.