Abhigyan Singhal
@Abhi-gyan · 2:15
In conversation with Mr. Sharadindu Jana - Founder and creator of "After Hours" a football coaching academy with different objectives
He's also my football captain and also a very dear friend. So he's a lawyer who has graduated from Crystal University, Bangladesh. He did that for five years. He played football, and in addition to that, he worked in the corporate field for another two years. After figuring out that this is not what his passion is and his passion is only football. He went to coach at Etsy Bola, which is a Barcelona based Academy in Bangalore. Now this not being enough for him
Abhigyan Singhal
@Abhi-gyan · 0:24
Hi Jana, it's an absolute pleasure of mine to have you on this application. I know football is a big, big passion of yours and also so is Liverpool and so is coaching. So I wanted to take this opportunity to introduce, use you and hopefully ask a few questions so that people can have an understanding of what it is you do and also how interesting your work is
Sharadindu Jana
@jansnow · 0:33
Hi, Abigail. Absolutely thrilled to be working with you on this and sharing my journey and my story, for which you have been a significant part of it as well. This is going to be a really interesting voice note series, I believe. And I hope that people have a lot of takeaway from this conversation. Thank you for such a kind introduction for the Academy and the journey that is really close to me. So yeah, let's get started
Abhigyan Singhal
@Abhi-gyan · 0:47
So where did your motivation change from becoming a corporate lawyer to becoming a football coach? I understand that you have gotten your licenses as well from the Orlando Football Federation. So was this switch an overnight switch, or was it something you'd thought you see yourself doing in the future
Sharadindu Jana
@jansnow · 1:31
And the non selfish reason to coach was the mistakes that I did, for example, play with the same set of people for ten years and not playing the right kind of football or the right places to play football. I would not let the kids in my area who were also as clueless as me to go through other same thing because I could see talent. But I knew that if we continue this way, the talent would never be recognized
Sharadindu Jana
@jansnow · 3:27
And same thing for the girls, like the girls program was initiated because I wanted to see them add new dimensions of personality they are and the fact that girls can also play the sport. And honestly saying, you the girls classes are so much more fun. They perform so well and the progress is so much quicker than the boys because they're learning things from the start. With the boys, we need to unlearn a lot of things and then proceed further. So it's been a great experience
Abhigyan Singhal
@Abhi-gyan · 2:30
I feel that a lot of the times, the structure is very negligent and not very well catered to. So I wanted to know, have you noticed a change in the amount of people coming to play? Are there multiple tournaments for women to play in football? Is there a structure which is evolving which enables people to enable women to make this a proper, established career where there can be monetary benefits and other can also be benefits of following your passion
Sharadindu Jana
@jansnow · 4:22
One is development, one is elite and one is hustle. So hustle being the girls now in the girls, we have about 20 to 22 players now, these girls are also enrolled in the case of a division this year, so they got to play the professional circuit a bit and a couple of tournaments as well. So that was really fun. And the boys, we have about 40 boys developed and grouped into development and elite
Abhigyan Singhal
@Abhi-gyan · 1:17
Absolutely interesting and very riveting considering the fact that you are coaching students because you want to make sure that the standard of football and your passion and people who are coming to you get the best they can get and obviously build a rapper with each one of your students. And also I would like to say that it's very eye opening and very fresh to see that you're taking into account the importance of women's football and the importance of making sure that there's a prevalent structure, good structure
Sharadindu Jana
@jansnow · 0:56
Well, for the women, it starts with the KSFA division, and then it comes the Super League, which is like the Super Division. And then you have the Indian Women's League. So other are only three divisions in the women's football. So this is the pathway for you. And then if you play the Super League or the Indian Women's League for the women's, you get selected or you Scout for the top teams and into the national circuit
Abhigyan Singhal
@Abhi-gyan · 2:16
What are the needs and the requirements? So obviously, you knowing that you've been in other circuit for such a long time. I'm sure your students will obviously get so much benefit out of this. It's absolutely amazing. And I'm a little bit envious but also very happy that you've taken this step so that you can mold the future generations towards football, which I personally is an amazing sport. I think it's the best sport on the planet
Swell Team
@Swell · 0:15
Sharadindu Jana
@jansnow · 3:32
So he was like when he went for a trip abroad, for example, to places like Uruguay, Brazil and the South Americans and Europe and all that he saw that every kid who liked playing football was involved in some League or the other, which was termed as baby leagues
Abhigyan Singhal
@Abhi-gyan · 2:43
The infrastructure is being molded in such a manner that our children, I mean, the younger generation, the six to ten years old, are starting to play. I mean, you don't become an overnight success, obviously. And you can take examples from any good player like Messi, for example, started kicking football at the age of five. Nobody would have known that Messi was going to become messy. But Messi became messy