2012 Audi Football Summit - India's best vs Germany's finest

The Audi Football Summit will be played on January 10, 2012 at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium in New Delhi with the Indian national football team taking on German football giants FC Bayern Munich. The match also marks the farewell game for long-time India captain Baichung Bhutia and proceeds from the game will go to the victims of the Sikkim earthquake.


FC Bayern Munich are the most successful club in the history of the Bundesliga, the top tier of German football. They have won 21 Bundesliga titles since the inception of the league in 1963 along with 15 German Cup (DFB Pokal) trophies. The club has also four UEFA Champions League wins to their name besides the 1967 UEFA Cup Winners' Cup and the 1996 UEFA Cup (now UEFA Europa League) titles. The Bavarians are financially the most stable and profitable club in Europe with a state-of-the-art stadium in the Allianz Arena, a 69,000 capacity venue.

Currently Bayern Munich are coached by seasoned Jupp Heynckes, who is with the club since the start of the season for a third stint. The club is captained by Philipp Lahm, who also happens to be the Germany captain. Other star players at the club include Frenchman Franck Ribéry, Dutchman Arjen Robben besides German internationals Bastian Schweinsteiger, Thomas Mueller, Manuel Neuer and Mario Gomez to name a few. The club has players from nine nations as part of their 24 player professional squad.


Team India is in a transitional phase. The generation of the Baichung Bhutia's, Renedy Singh's, Mahesh Gawli's, Deepak Mondal's, Climax Lawrence's and co had their last big hurrah at the 2011 AFC Asian Cup in January in Qatar. It was the first time in 27 years that India qualified for Asia's showpiece football event, but now after the tournament new, young players have come into the national team with the aim to push Indian football to new unknown heights in international football.

The star players of Team India are striker Sunil Chhetri, goalkeeper Subrata Pal, defender Gouramangi Singh and utility player Syed Rahim Nabi with 20 year old Jeje Lalpekhlua the brightest young prodigy. A lot will be expected from these players against Bayern Munich. The match also marks the end of an era as Baichung Bhutia is set to don the India jersey for one last time, nearly 17 years after his first match for India and over 100 internationals later.


On the sidelines of the big match there will also be the India finals of the FC Bayern Youth Cup. The preliminary rounds with close to a 1,000 children participating were held in Delhi (October 2011) and Mumbai (December 2011) with the scouted boys facing each other at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium. The best will be chosen by FCB scouts to represent India at the international FC Bayern Youth Cup in Munich in May 2012.


German carmaker Audi AG, a subsidiary of the Volkswagen AG, has a long-standing relationship with sports, especially with the game of association football. Though motorsports does come more naturally for a carmaker, football has been something which has grown in importance for the company in recent years.

Audi has its best known tie-up in football with German Bundesliga giants FC Bayern Munich, where Audi is not only a sponsor but also a 10% stakeholder in the Bavarian club. Audi further is sponsor/partner of European football giants FC Barcelona, Real Madrid, AC Milan and Zenit St. Petersburg (Russia) besides Bundesliga sides Borussia Mönchengladbach, Hamburger SV, 1.FC Nürnberg, 1899 Hoffenheim and Hertha BSC Berlin. Audi sponsors its local home town team FC Ingolstadt 04, who currently play in the 2.Bundesliga (second tier).


More information about the match and where to buy tickets online are available at www.audifootballsummit.in . Tickets are priced between Rs. 100 and 3,000.

The official Twitter account of the Audi Football Summit can be found under www.twitter.com/AudiFS2012 .