East Bengal football club in Financial Crisis

Among all of Indian football club, I have been following east Bengal from my school days. It hurt me when I heard news claiming that East Bengal might not take part in AFC cup due to financial crisis they are facing. They are still in talk with UB group whose owner is Mr. Vijay Malia to get them bail out, ironically who himself need bail out for his airlines.

What is wrong with Kolkata football in general, why they are not able to cope up with new system of football, an organized way to go?

Recently I praised East Bengal for maintaining much of their core squad for almost three year with coach also. In Kolkata any coach who survive more than three year, you know he is doing something good. So from where this financial crisis came from. Let go to various point which is haunting East Bengal right now.

UB Half ownership: I have never fan of UB group half ownership of East Bengal and Half of Mohan Bagan. They are financing both of the best club in India in term of history and in term of Fan base. There are virtually holding both clubs in term of finance and also in term of growth. I know it is little bit immature to say but I think East Bengal should find a suitable buyer which can back them and buy their share from UB group. Let them have Mohan Bagan and enjoy, but at least we will find some new partner as well.

Branding: This is the team which is remotely overlooked by India football team. If you see the stats of facebook then you will find out east Bengal has more fans than Newcastle United and few other. I have not find any of update from east Bengal to get there player engaged in media activity, promotion activity and also there is no update form them until match is ended. For east Bengal they should get there branding bang on right so they can attract more sponsor in club.

Club functioning: This is one thing which I will never understand about Kolkata club. How they work, what are their motivation behind any decision about the club. I think they need to be little bit more transparent in the way they work to get club in right place.

East Bengal has a potential of being one of the giant of the asia but if these kind of functioning are run in Kolkata football club, then there would be a day when east Bengal might see a day like Mohammadan sporting. 

P.S.: Let’s hope that East Bengal participate in AFC cup and might get bail out this time.

The Rise of East Bengal in Virtual World

Well I was amazed when I read this piece of news somewhere. I did little bit research to find the truth behind it.

East Bengal's official Facebook page has more than 4 lakh likes. That's a staggering statistic considering the poor turnouts in even their home matches of the I-League. Only three in Asia had more in the list of the top 100 clubs as released by futebolfinance.com last April.

All three - Persib Bandung (2 million+), Sriwijaya FC (6.4 lakh+), Persija Jakarta (3.9 lakh+) - are from Indonesia. East Bengal's page had more than 3.5 lakh back then. On Thursday, the number had swelled over 4.70 lakh.

East Bengal's page is handled by the company that bankrolls the football team. "Facebook has great potential to reach out to fans and attract new ones. That is why we regularly update our page and try to make it as interactive as possible," said a representative of the team that handles the page. Other pages related to Indian football also have sizeable membership. Twitter too has accounts of Indian clubs and others dedicated to domestic football. The numbers here are smaller possibly because Indians still use Twitter less.

How it started

Following domestic football through social media started in 2007 on Orkut when a community named 'Indian football fans' was formed to discuss everything and anything related to the sport in India.

Membership kept increasing and that laid the foundation for more such communities. As Indians shifted from Orkut to Facebook, the platform for following Indian football also changed but the passion only increased. Archrivals Mohun Bagan (14000 + likes) and some older clubs haven't gone the East Bengal way but newbies such as Pune FC (30000+), Shillong Lajong (10000+) and United Sikkim (3000+) are using social media very seriously.

The I-League and other domestic tournaments continue to struggle to get fans to the stadiums. On the social media, the opposite is true.

Now Some facts of social science:
Most liked clubs:
Barcelona 33 Million+
Real Madrid 29 Million+
Man Utd 26 Million+
Those beaten by East Bengal:
Newcastle Utd 293 Lakh+
Atletico Madrid 2.7 Lakh+
East Bengal Fan likes 4.70 (As on July 9th 2012)….

P.S.: Now I am one of the proud fan of east Bengal. We need to create more online fan and also get them involved in the facebook as well.