We want to be in ISL: Fabio Ferreira on Sreenidi Deccan's vision

Fabio Ferreira spoke about how he plans to increase the commercial value of the club.

Sreenidi Deccan FC are making significant strides in reviving the football culture in Hyderabad, a city with a rich history of legendary footballers who represented India. Names like SK Azizuddin, Victor Amalraj, Syed Naeemuddin, Shahid Waseem, Shabbir Ali, and Mohammed Habib are well-known figures in Hyderabad's football folklore.

By the early 2000s, the city's football culture had dwindled as cricket took centre stage. However, in 2020, the All India Football Federation (AIFF) announced Sreenidi Deccan as one of the two corporate entries in the 2021 edition of the I-League. This move garnered national attention, and the club had already begun a grassroots development project in 2018.

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Sreenidi Deccan FC hired Fabio Ferreira, a young Portuguese Sports Science Degree holder, as their Chief Footballing Officer to spearhead this initiative. The 31-year-old has helped build the club from scratch. Even though the club has only played two seasons in the I-League, the operations of the academy started in the year 2018. Over the course of five years, the club has made significant progress in grassroots development.

In this interview, Fabio Ferreira spoke about his move to India, his views on grassroots development, club's short and long-term visions and the sustainable and organic growth of the club. Excerpts as below:

Move to India at such an early age

Fabio Ferreira, at the young age of 25, was given the opportunity to lead the grassroots development project in India, a task that was relatively unknown to him. When asked about his move to India and this new challenge, Ferreira said: “Yeah so I came to India in 2018 as you might be aware. They started this project with me in May 2018, although in March that year I had come for one week approximate to see the place, to visit the owner, to understand the project, exactly what I'll be stepping in.

"So when I came, one of the things that motivated me a lot was the project, its ambition and its vision. The one I read for the club, that it was to be one of the best youth academies in India and one of the best football clubs in India. So that itself is a big word. You see, there is a big challenge in front of our eyes. So that is obviously for someone at that age, a huge challenge. But why not take it? It's a huge motivation to work every day too. Because we know that if we are successful in accomplishing that, it can be something very rewarding, and it will make you feel really happy," he added.

Furthermore, for him the motivation was to contribute to the development of football in India, “Another aspect that really motivated me to come and accept the challenge was the opportunity to directly contribute to the development of football in India. Because as you are aware, football has been growing in the past years. There is still a long way to go, but I was having the opportunity to be directly working on that and be part of that. Those were the things that really motivated me and I end up accepting the challenge.”

On taking up a coaching role for Telangana Sub-junior side

In 2019, Fabio Ferreira assumed an unconventional coaching position with the Telangana sub-junior team, marking a rare instance of a foreign coach taking on such a role. Reflecting on this decision, he stated,  “There is a good relationship between the club and the state association. And one of our commitments since the beginning was to provide support to them and try to improve the football ecosystem in Hyderabad."

He added, "The other one was to start looking for a place for our academy, our elite academy, the ones that will be on full scholarship. And for someone who had reached the country, I would say two months, after two months I was having access, at least in trials, to the best talent and the U-14 talent from Telangana in 2018. So I was able to understand very fast what will be the context, where are we, where can we place these players.”

He explained that this coaching move gave him an understanding of the talent and the grassroots facilities in Telangana, “It allowed me to understand that talent exists there. I don't know if you are aware that in that year we became South Zone champions and then we went to play the finals in Arunachal Pradesh and we finished top six for Telangana, which has never been in any finals or competing at any level. And from that pool of players that was with us in that year, 50% of them approximately integrated our elite academy. They were given full scholarship and we brought them to the club. And a few of them are now with a professional contract with us. So I would say that it was a good experience.”

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Sustainable and organic growth

When Sreenidi Deccan FC were granted an I-League spot in 2020 for the 2021-22 season, the club generated significant excitement and anticipation. When asked about the club's long-term and short-term visions, Fabio Ferreira, the Portuguese Chief Footballing Officer, provided a comprehensive overview of the club's ambitions. He explained that the club's primary objective is to establish a sustainable foundation for the future:

 “In football, if you want to achieve high levels of success, you have to follow along and be sustainable on the long term. It's not to be successful for only a year or two and then shut down. If you want to be successful, reach the top and then be there for a long time; you need to have a strong foundation. So one of our first priorities when we started in 2018 was facilities, which needs to be done to have a top professional club in India. That will sustain the club in the long term.

"If you notice, obviously we are not here discussing what is right or wrong, but in many clubs in India, the approach is different. I used to say, they build their houses from the ceiling and outside, and the foundations of the house is not there. So, in the practical terms, many clubs, when you look at commercial marketing, first team operations, these are things they run pretty well.”

Other than that, he explained,“ When you look at the foundations, grassroots, youth academy facilities, sometimes it's not so well-structured. And then you see clubs moving from city to city, corporate to corporate, because they end up not being able to sustain. So for us, it was one of the first priorities to build that foundation that would allow us to have a long-term plan. Post that, obviously, we focus on the youth academy development. That's what we did until 2020, when we bid for the I-League. And then we had our first participation in 2021-22. “

He further went on and expressed immense pride and excitement regarding the club's current achievements on grassroots and future aspirations, “If you see, Sreenidi is now able to have a world-class facility that we own. We have all the youth academies, full scholarship from the U-13 to the U-19 age group. We have our reserve team professional, and we have our first team professional. We have players who represented India (at the SAFF U-16 Championships) at Bhutan. We have two players there. We have our grassroots programmes running. So if you ask me what's next, in a short time one of our priorities is to increase the grassroots." 

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Challenges faced by the club in Hyderabad

The 31-year-old also spoke about the challenges the club faced in developing a footballing culture. He said, “For Hyderabad, it's a big challenge to bring people, because that's how you develop a culture. You bring the kid, then you have a four or five-month league. On the weekends, the mom will come, the dad will come, the uncle will come. And then over a period of five years, you will develop a culture. They will also come to see your first team matches. So that's one of our primary targets now.”

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Club's vision and developing commercial aspects

The Portuguese furthermore added his views on club's visions and emphasized and enhanced the commercial appeal to the clubs, “Obviously, looking at the medium and long term, we want to be in ISL. I don't know if it will take one year, two years or three years, but we want to be there. In terms of facilities development, our stadium now has a capacity for 5,000 people. We want to bring that up to 8,000. We have three football grounds. It's going to be four in the next two years. We are also going to develop high-performance centers for football in the next 3-4 years. This is where we want to be because we know this is very important for the next 20-30 years of the club and Indian football."

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In addition to the above he quoted, “One important aspect for us is the commercial value. We need to increase that. We need to work together with the clubs, AIFF and league organizers to increase the commercial value of the different leagues so that hopefully in the short-term or medium-term, we can start generating some revenue to reduce the losses that the clubs are incurring. These are the 2-3 parameters that are important for us in the next few years.

"And obviously, in the next 5-8 years, even if it's just pre-qualification stage, we want to be in the AFC competitions as well. Even if not in the final stage or group stage, but at least be able to reach that level. And then step by step, why not compete there as well.”

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