I-League 2017: Confusion reigns over fixture list for this season

What's the story?

The I-League is well and truly underway for another season of thrills and spills but it appears that fans shouldn't get too excited when it comes to seeing their favourite teams playing against the other clubs on a particular day.

In other words, don't mark your calendars just yet. It seems that the fixture list prepared by the authorities is subject to a host of changes following several complaints from club management that the fixtures were too hectic and practically impossible to go through with. One such perplexed authority figure is Minerva Punjab's owner Ranjit Bajaj who revealed to Sportskeeda his disappointment over the haphazard fixture list-

"If you look at our fixtures, we apparently play a match on the 6th, 10th, 13th, 14th, and then on 17th. We can't do that. I called them (AIFF) up as soon as we got these fixture changes. They agreed that it was not possible for us to play like this, and said that these fixtures will be further changed".

In case you didn't know...

Amid heavy competition from the Indian Super League (ISL), this season the I-League has been under the scanner like never before and the owners of various clubs have been left frustrated over the baffling list of fixtures for this season.

The heart of the matter

Ranjit Bajaj of the Minerva Punjab team not only aired his grievances to us personally, but even took to social media to highlight the problem. And it can now be ascertained that the fixtures would further be scrutinised to see if any more changes need to be made.

Apparently according to this we play on 10 / 13 /14 th January - not possible for us to do @Minerva_AFC .... so this will be changed guys ...

— Ranjit Bajaj (@THE_RanjitBajaj) December 14, 2017

This has become a huge problem for the I-League authorities to contend with after the season has already begun.

What's next?

As things stand, the games will continue to be played as per the original schedule till more developments take place.

Author's take

The shabby job of making fixtures has been highlighted rightly by clubs part of the league and it shows the lack of common sense in a problem which should have been sorted out way before the league began.