Haryana to get Centre of Excellence for Soccer

Football in Haryana will get a major boost with a Centre of Excellence for Soccer (CoES) set to be build in the state. Partners in the project will be the Haryana Football Association (HFA), the Dutch Haryana Foundation (DHF) and Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce & Industry (FICCI); who signed a Memorandum of Understanding for strategic cooperation at FICCI House in New Delhi on Friday. Besides the development of the CoES the partners will also try to develop, operate and manage football centres and infrastructures throughout the state.

In terms of the MoU, for the proposed Centre of Excellence, DHF will establish a consortium of Dutch sports organizations which have sports offering focused on a long term football development program, such as the Royal Dutch Football Association, the club ADO Den Haag, the Johan Cryuff Institute and others.

The MoU was signed by DHF president Oedith N. Jaharia; FICCI Secretary General Dr. Amit Mitra and Haryana FA president Deepender S. Hooda. The three parties to the MoU have agreed that the selection of probables will be done from various sources including the State Sports and Physical Aptitude Test (SPAT) program which consists a ready database of 46,000 athletes in various age groups across Haryana.

It is agreed between parties that a two weeks pilot program will be conducted to decide the further technical and infrastructural requirements of Haryana State to develop the said CoES plans. Thereafter, HFA and FICCI will invite the technical staff and youth players of ADO Den Hague to Haryana. During the two weeks the technical staff of ADO will make further analysis and give advice to the alliance.

FICCI will create awareness about the need of for increasing corporate participation in sports as sponsors at a more fundamental level that can bring about a critical difference in India's medal winning prospects. It will promote and market the concept of SPAT and PPP in sports development during its conferences/ events; coordinate with DHF and HFA to implement this concept; and facilitate greater interaction between industry and Government of Haryana to increase industrial participation in sports.

HFA will coordinate with the Haryana Government and on long term release provide stadium infrastructure required to operate the CoES, conduct all related surveys and collect all market information required for the project. It will also seek all necessary support from the State Government and make the project successful and will endeavor make CoES a Private Public Partnership model.

DHF will bring in all necessary knowledge required to impart world class training and coaching towards the operations of the project. The participants in the Dutch Sports Consortium as coordinated by DHF will under commercial conditions provide the project with expertise and technical know-how to create, plan, manage and operate the project. It will exclusively work with HFA and vice-versa in the field of football training & coaching and infrastructure management and development in the territory during the term of this MoU.

The discussions about such a partnership were started at the first-ever FICCI Sports Summit last year in New Delhi and followed up at this years event. Getting Dutch football expertise for Haryana would be something which should take their football forward.