Interview with Churchill Alemao: “We should have become the most successful I-League club by now”

Churchill Alemao and her daughter Valanka hold the I-League trophy

The right investments at the right time were instrumental in Churchill Brothers’ second I-League success and it was celebrated in style by the football-crazy Churchill family. But behind all that excitement lies the harsh reality of not having any financial return from Indian football.

Even a company that promised to sponsor the club failed to fulfill the commitments and the family had to even sell property to maintain the functioning of the team.

A visit to the Churchill family’s residence, the Alemao mansion in Varca, South Goa, will once again remind you why no other I-League club has more passionate owners, as everything about the place breathes football. Every trophy that the club has won has a place in the specially made cabinet.

Although Churchill Alemao has been the face of the club for so long, the next generation is also catching up now as daughter Valanka is the club CEO, son Savio is the patron and nephew Frazer is the general manager.

But it’s senior Alemao who has overseen the growth of the club from scratch and been their driving force.

“Football is in our blood. I have put my life into football and this football club. In fact, my entire family is passionate about the game and we have done everything to make this club successful as often we have even had to sell property,” Churchill Alemao stated in an exclusive chat with Sportskeeda.

There can’t be anything better for the Churchill family than the sight of their players lifting the I-League trophy and this time they did it for the second time, of course. But senior Alemao has a different perspective.

“Winning the I-League for the second time is not a big thing for me because if you analyse our seasons in the top flight we have been runners-up five times and finished third thrice. So on several occasions we have missed out on the title narrowly. We should have actually become the most successful team by now.

“However, I must admit that this time the players gave everything and played as if they were playing for their lives. Thanks to their efforts and by God’s grace, I was lucky enough to see my club become the champion of India for the second time,” the Churchill Brothers owner and president stated with plenty of emotion.

The hunger for further success in the Churchill family is possibly what has made the club one of the most consistent in the combined history of the NFL and I-League and the next target is to be the best in Asia.

“My dream now is to see this club become Asian champion. Even last season I wanted a good showing in the AFC Cup but our technical director didn’t take the tournament seriously as he often didn’t travel with the team or select the best players,” Alemao pointed out.

Next season, each club will be allowed to field four foreigners in the starting eleven, which would limit chances of several Indian players especially the strikers. Alemao acknowledges the problems that Indians may face but still feels the number of foreigners should increase as he believes the local players can learn from outstation talent.

“If you have a team with 11 Indian players then not even 10 percent of the people, who come for the matches now, will be there at the stadium. So you need to have foreigners because Indian players can learn from them. Bhaichung Bhutia learned by playing against the likes of Chima (Okorie) so similarly the current Indian players will also benefit from the presence of quality foreigners,”

Alemao also talked about the importance of naturalising foreigners for the betterment of the national team.

“You see even in a country like France where there is so much talent in football, even their national team have so many players who were born outside the country and that makes a huge difference. In many other Asian countries, when there were no foreigners, there would be no fans at the ground because they were happy watching European football on television. Hence, the presence of foreigners in domestic leagues is very important,” said the owner of the club, which has been the breeding ground for several previous quality foreigners in Indian football like Emeka Ezeugo, Yusif Yakubu, Odafa Okolie and most-recently Bilal Najjarin.