It’s June 2014. I enter a house where there’s a “sick party” going on, and spot people wearing Argentina football jerseys. They’re staring intently at the television. Then the curtains to the left of the screen part, and out comes the potbellied owner of the house. I introduce myself as “Adi’s nephew” and join at least two dozen other jersey-wearing revellers gazing at the screen. Lionel Messi, along with the rest of the Argentine team, is attempting to win the World Cup against Germany. Unsuccessfully.
The “Argentines” depart soon after the match concludes, slinking away to their own little corners of Mumbai. For the “Germans” on the other hand — the ones with German football jerseys, at any rate — the party is just getting started. They won! Or at least the team they support did.
In reality, there weren’t any actual Argentines or Germans around that night. Just Indians. Football-crazy Indians who don’t care that — apart from the odd sponsor whose name and logo will flash on the sidelines — there isn’t anything remotely Indian about the Fifa World Cup.
For the time being at least, the Indian team is quite a way off from qualifying for the senior Fifa World Cup. In fact, its only World Cup appearance was at the Under-17 level last year, when India hosted the tournament. And yet, Indians still love the event. They also love the teams that participate, dividing themselves into loyal, diehard fans of one squad or another. That means picking a team — be it Germany, Brazil or Belgium — and sticking with it to the bitter end, come what may. Switching sides is a no-no; an unspoken rule.
People in Kolkata and Kerala have a fondness for the South American teams. In Goa, the Portuguese are especially popular. Elsewhere people love the Italian team, though for this year’s World Cup, in Russia, they’ll have to choose another team. Italy failed to qualify.
India’s second-most popular sport
The adopt-a-team phenomenon is so prevalent that one of India’s biggest sports broadcasters, SPN Sports (Sony Pictures Networks), built its entire World Cup campaign around the fanatical support Indians show for the teams of other nations. The campaign, called Meri Doosri Country (My Second Country or My Other Country) embraces and celebrates this dual nationalism.
In terms of viewership, football is now India’s second-most popular sport, after cricket of course. In urban areas, European clubs enjoy massive support, and have spawned an entire culture around football club fandom. But when the World Cup year comes around, even fringe viewers get in on the fun, catapulting Fifa viewership to greater heights than the English Premier League or La Liga matches. At times, club rivalries are also set aside to support a national team collectively.
Bhaichung Bhutia, a former captain of India’s national team, lent the Meri Doosri Country trend even more cultural legitimacy but revealing his own “second country” for this year’s World Cup. “While I am confident that we will see our football team in the World Cup one day, Meri Doosri Country will be Argentina this year,” he said.
It’s not that India doesn’t try. Every four years, the Indian team embarks on a World Cup qualification campaign with varying degrees of success.
Clearly, there’s a huge gulf still between India and the best football-playing nations in Asia, let alone the world. No matter. Till July 15, we’ll all become foreigners, screaming with joy for every goal “our” team scores, each of us passionately defending our favourite player from anyone who dares to trip him up. The old Messi vs Ronaldo debate will rear its head once again, and we’ll all joke about how the World Cup is incomplete without a certain Zlatan Ibrahimovic.
All of that will change, of course, when India makes its first appearance at a World Cup. But for the time being, let’s enjoy the event for what it is — one of the greatest sporting spectacles in the world — and in the way only India can.
— Worldcrunch, in partnership with The Wire/New York Times News Service
Suyash Upadhyaya is a sports writer based in New Delhi.
