AIFF puts up brave face, says won't impact much by football demotion

New Delhi, May 23 (UNI) The AIFF today put up a brave face on government's demotion of football from the priority list but said it would urge the Sports Ministry for the game's reinstatement to its old status.

''I don't see not much adverse impact by the demotion. We can manage, but still we are hoping to talk to the government on the issue,'' AIFF General Secretary Alberto Colaco said in an informal interaction with reporters here today.

Sports Ministry's recent downgradation of football from 'Priority' to 'Others' list would substantially reduce government grants for the game in the country.

However, Mr Colaco said since the Federation never got financial assistance from the government there was no question of fall in financial resources of AIFF.

''The only problem could be in using the training facilities.

Earlier, we could use governemnt facilities like Sports Authority of India (SAI) Centres at the governemnet expenses but now we have to make our own arrangements,'' said Mr Colaco.

He said the Federation has the means to tackle the situation.

''We have facilities at Bangalore and Sikkim. We have also identified a place in Goa to develop an AIFF training centre which can accomodate around 50 players. It will be developed by using the FIFA yearly grant of Rs 250,000 dollars,'' Mr Colaco said.

UNI