The AIFF hired Costa Rican football coach Amelia Valarade to change the fortunes of the national women’s team but the transformation will take time

To make a mark at the continental tournaments like AFC Women’s Asian Cup Australia 2026, the national governing body of football in India —-All India Football Federation (AIFF) needs to steadily invest at the grassroots to have a bigger pool of talent. 

There must be policies by the AIFF to regulate unstructured ecosystem at grassroots level, but implementation isn’t visible as several state associations are being run on an ad-hoc basis.

Two back-to-back defeats in women’s 2027 World Cup qualifier in Australia exposes India’s fragile football ecosystem.

India lost 1-2 to Vietnam in their opening match and suffered 0-11 at the hands of Japan in the second Group C match. The AIFF roped in Costa Rican Amelia Valverde as head coach in preparation for the Australian leg of AFC.

But there are no quick fix solutions as the national team lacked skills and anticipation to tackle more organised football playing nations in the AFC tournament in Australia. It’s a different matter that the team outplayed Thailand, a better side, to advance to the Australian leg of the World Cup qualifier.

There are speculations that if India wins the match against Chinese Taipei by a big margin, the Indian team will have a chance to advance to quarterfinals and earn a ticket to the 2007 World Cup in Brazil. But the bottom line is India’s head coach will have limited options ahead of the last and final Group C match in Sydney. She has to juggle with a list of players available and doesn’t have a magic wand!

EOM