Arsenal In... India

After Maire Ofeire, Tim Oates, and Simon Johnson wrote Arsenal in Ireland, South Africa, and Australia respectively, the Arsenal In... series now focuses on India.

India was a country which was always inclined towards two things as far as youngsters are concerned—studies and cricket. Football started to gain a considerable amount of acceptance among the youth towards the end of the 1990s.

The globalization of the English Premier League found its way to India, with local sports network ESPN-Star telecasting at the turn of the millennium. 

Most youngsters immediately started to support one of Manchester United or Arsenal (most of them choosing the former) due to their intense rivalry during that period. Liverpool fans can also be found (although, I haven't managed to find many!) and Chelsea fans are new kids on the block—after they got all the money and won a couple of titles.

As far as Arsenal are concerned, most Arsenal fans in India associate themselves with Arsene Wenger's team. Not all the fans watch each and every game, but the support for the team is quite strong.

Unlike other Western countries, due to the relative youth of the Premier League in India, there are no official support groups in India for Arsenal. That said, you can see a considerable presence of Arsenal fans on social networking websites such as Facebook or Orkut.

Due to the lack of popularity of football in India, the only footballer who got closest to playing in the English Premier League was Baichung Bhutia, who played for Bury from 1999-02.

However, last year Arsenal teamed up with TATA Tea, a subsidiary of the TATA Group to take in 16 youngsters (aged between 10 and 15 years) who would be trained by Arsenal in London. A number of youngsters took the opportunity to impress, with the final 16 being selected from states such as Karnataka and Sikkim.

These youngsters may very well be the next pin-up boys in Indian households.

Funnily enough, Arsenal fans in India feel that Manchester United are bigger rivals than Tottenham Hotspur. It's odd, but that can primarily attributed to the fact that the English Premier League became popular during the acrimonious rivalry between the two clubs.

Due to the intense following of clubs such as Arsenal and Manchester United in India, the Board of Control for Cricket in India promoted its own T-20 competition in a similar format to the English Premier League, known as the Indian Premier League. 

Even the people who run the most popular sport in India want to emulate the English Premier League. 

Arsenal and the top four clubs are doing a lot in India to garner support for football. The Indian youth now know a lot about the sport, and participation in football is growing.

With football in India becoming more and more popular by the day, we might well see some Indian players ply their trade in Europe soon.

As far as Arsenal is concerned, their brand of football under Le Boss is certainly doing a lot to improve the support base in India.