ABSTRACT
For a country ranked 140 in the FIFA world rankings, one whose team had lost in the first round of the pre-world-cup qualifiers, and one which has never played in the world cup finals, this description has a quality of the unreal. Sport in India, like in more advanced Western nations, is part of the integrated global leisure and entertainment industries. Local soccer administrators, watching international leagues, are keen to rope in foreign players to improve the standard of play. Deliberating on the Special Officer’s report, Chartered Accountants D. K. Basu and Company, appointed auditors of the All India Football Federation by the High Court in March 2001, added a further list of anomalies to the already existing list of discrepancies. Brazilian striker Jose Barreto, who played for Mohun Bagan for three consecutive seasons, was the highest paid player on Indian soil for some time.
