Fifa Foes

THE PHONY WAR—that fallow period when players who’ve already suffered through the rigours of the European season join their national teams and limber up for the World Cup with a series of meandering ‘friendlies’—lasts an eternity.

- Shougat Dasgupta

The Champions League final took place in Kiev on May 27, just three weeks before the World Cup begins in Moscow. Starved of football, some of India’s armchair fans even dragged them selves to the Mumbai Football Arena to watch captain Sunil Chhetri play his 100th game for India. He scored twice, taking his tally in the last two games to five and his overall tally to an astonishing 61, placing him behind only Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi in the list of most prolific, still-active inter national goalscorers. Chhetri had to make a personal appeal on Twitter to fans, so exercised by the European clubs they follow and, during the World Cup, by their “doosri country”, as the advertising campaign puts it, to show up. Indian football authorities must ask themselves why they don’t work harder to convert passive support for inter national football into active support for local clubs and the national team; why they don’t seek to attract more investment into historic clubs and the grassroots rather than trumped-up corporate leagues featuring retired Europeans.

Players to Watch

MOHAMED SALAH

If unhampered by concerns about his shoulder, Salah will be a blur of sharp movement. Once a winger, he has become a finisher at Liverpool, cutting inside menacing defenders with his speed and aggression. Can he take Egypt past the group stage?