

Panaji: The All India Football Federation (AIFF) is exploring the possibility of playing the remainder of Indian Arrows’ home matches in Goa.

Indian Arrows , the developmental side of the AIFF consisting largely of players from the Fifa U-17 World Cup team, played their first two home matches at the GMC Athletic Stadium after their home ground in Delhi was unavailable. The Nehru Stadium in Delhi is now ready to host matches; the Indian Super League (ISL) matches have already kicked off in the Capital, but the AIFF is having second thoughts about moving back home.

“It’s much better here in Goa. The training grounds are good. The Arrows team has quality opposition for friendlies and it’s much easier to obtain permissions. It makes no sense to go back to Delhi,” a senior AIFF official told TOI on Wednesday.

FC

The AIFF has not taken a final decision as yet. Indian Arrows will play their next match at home against Gokulam Kerala FC on December 22.

Indian Arrows have three points in their kitty, thanks to their opening round win against Chennai City FC, but they were found wanting against Minerva Punjab FC in their 0-2 loss on Tuesday.

Ghanaian striker William Opoku Asiedu scored both the goals for Minerva, once in each half, to ground Indian Arrows and coach Luis Norton de Matos was not pleased with the way the visitors approached this match, particularly after they blocked their loaned players Jeakson Singh, Anwar Ali and Nongdamba Naorem.

"I'm disappointed because as a coach I would like to always have my best players and take my options as I'm working for the development of football. Three of my players could not play tonight who could have been decisive," said de Matos during the post-match media interaction.

In a separate post on a social networking website, the Portuguese coach was even more scathing.

“Why Minerva did not authorise the use of three under-17 players? Fear of not being able to secure victory? Did they really need this attitude to beat an under-17 team? They don’t have confidence in their good players and coaching staff? Strange philosophy of a senior professional team that uses five foreign players.

“A youth football development project in a country and the progress of its players will always have priority over individual interests of a club desirous of winning a match at any price,” said de Matos.