Constantine poised for a second stint

Published - December 21, 2014 06:39 pm IST - Mumbai:

Stephen Constantine is possibly heading towards a second stint as coach of the Indian football team.

The 52-year-old English-Cypriot was in-charge of the national team from 2002 to 2005. And after nearly 10 years of coaching club and national teams in England, Malawi, Sudan, Cyprus, Greece and Rwanda, Constantine has become the front-runner with Ricki Herbert, the New Zealand coach for nine years, for the post that Englishman Ashley Westwood was widely speculated to get.

The AIFF has decided to shear the basic coast of employing the senior team coach by over $10,000 per month and also adhere to the advice given by its immediate past technical director Rob Baan that the coach should have the experience of coaching National teams, not merely club teams.

The new coach is likely to be paid between $15,000 and $20,000 per month as against the $30,000 paid to the Wim Koevermans, whose contract ended on October 31.

“We agree with Bann and have short-listed Constantine and Herbert. We will take a final call in the next three to five days. They had applied for the job; otherwise we would have considered Westwood (FC Bengaluru coach) and Trevor Morgan (former East Bengal coach and recently with Kerala Blasters),” said Bhaichung Bhutia, chairman of the AIFF Technical Committee, here on Sunday.

Germans for under-17 coaching job

The committee has also narrowed the selection of the National under-17 coach to Germans Nicolai Adam and Bernard Lippert.

Adam has been strongly recommended by the German Football Federation and FIFA. “Whereas we want to avoid big spends on the senior team coach, we are in favour of a decent salary to the under-17 coach because of the FIFA u-17 World Cup to be held in India in 2017.

“A decision will be taken on the under-17 coach by the end of this month, but we have chosen Australian Scott O’Donnell as the Technical Director. Scott is familiar with our ‘Lakshya’, the AIFF’s roadmap for Indian football,’’ said Bhutia after the AIFF’s Technical Committee meeting.

After joining Rwanda, Constantine had said: “I don’t care where it is geographically. I don’t care about what’s happening politically or religiously. I’m only interested in the football.”

During his first assignment, India’s ranking improved from 130 to 109 and Constantine has helped Rwanda rise from 131 to 68 in a short period of six months.

“The criteria was that whoever is chosen should know the inside-out of Indian football. We have to talk to both Constantine and Herbert. They will be located either at Delhi or Goa,” said Bhutia.

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