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East Bengal & Mohun Bagan officials slammed Bhaichung Bhutia, disclose their stand in AFC meeting

[caption id="attachment_46855" align="aligncenter" width="580"] The FPAI had a meeting with the top Indian players today to decide their stand in the AFC meeting. | Image: XtraTime[/caption] Kolkata: Kolkata giants East Bengal and Mohun Bagan had their "dress rehearsal" today at an aristrocrat club at Kolkata before heading towards the all important meeting at Kuala Lumpur on 7th June. Both the Kolkata teams have come to a decision with the IFA to go with seperate powerpoint presentations in the AFC meeting with the same pinch of claiming for a single league instead of two. After the meeting with the IFA, the East Bengal official Debabrata Sarkar said, "We want to have a single league and not two seperate leagues in Indian football. We might go with seperate presentations but our point of focus is very much the same. We will try to include the heritage of the two historic clubs."

The AIFF Vice-President Subrata Dutta also backed his support for the two Kolkata clubs as he said, "I also support the stand of the two Kolkata clubs as I strongly believe that there should always be a single league where all the clubs will be playing." The Kolkata clubs have also stated their views on franchise fees as they said that they already pay a certain amount of money as "registration fees" toplay the I-League and won't pay any extra money to play the proposed new league.

The club officials of the Kolkata giants personally attacked Indian football legend Bhaichung Bhutia for the view he shared about Indian football on Sunday at a press conference. Debabrata Sarkar said, "Bhaichung thinks he knows everything about football. But the fact is that he has always been a selfish guy and had never thought beyond his personal interest." Mohun Bagan official Debasish Dutta fumed in anger as he said, "Who is Bhaichung Bhutia? What is the significance of his words. If we have to give reactions to anyone's comments from the FPAI, we will answer to the comments of Renedy Singh, not Bhaichung Bhutia." He also added, "But I had a chat with Bhaichung for almost forty minutes yesterday, but he didn't say anything like that to me.

On the other hand, Bhaichung replied in his usual fashion as he said, "I expressed my personal opinion and I have every right to do that. One needs to understand that I am not a footballer anymore and whatever I said, I said to eradicate the unemployment problem in Indian football."