BCCI president Sourav Ganguly believes that the quality of Indian football has improved over the last six years with the onset of the Indian Super League (ISL).
Interacting with broadcaster Anant Tyagi on the official Instagram handle of ISL on Thursday, Ganguly spoke about how the league has shaped the fate of Indian football.
"The quality of Indian football has improved over the six years, standards of overseas players has improved in the ISL over the last few years, we have some great players in ATK Mohun Bagan, the Indian players have developed, when you play with players who are above your standard, your standard develops too. Mendoza played for Chennai in ISL and then he went on to play the English Premier League. I believe quality has improved enormously," said Ganguly during the live chat.
Talking about the difficulties faced by players in the bio-secure bubble, Ganguly said: "Lot of players who played in the Indian Premier League said that they did not realise the difficulty of staying in the bio-bubble as they were concerned with what was happening in the ground and I think it would be same with the players in the ISL as well." Ganguly also highlighted why it is paramount for every club to have more people in the squad for a tournament that is being played in the times of coronavirus.
"These are COVID requirements, you need to have more people in the squad, you need a bit more of backup when you are playing such a long tournament. ISL is a six-month tournament, it is important that you have a long squad, I haven't followed the schedule yet, but a bigger squad is important for a six-month-long tournament," said Ganguly.
Defending champions ATK and last season's I-League champions Mohun Bagan decided to join hands and form one team going into the seventh edition of the premier domestic football league in the country. The ISL will kick off from November 20 in Goa with Kerela Blasters taking on ATK Mohun Bagan. The tournament will be played behind closed doors this season.
