Fifteen minutes into Sunnil Chhetri’s first practice with the Kansas City Wizards in Phoenix, Arizona, Manager Peter Vermes had seen all he needed to see. Vermes had surveyed a plethora of players in advance of the 2010 MLS season, but it was immediately apparent to him that Chhetri had what it took to fit in with the team and the League. Ever the master of understatement, Vermes summed up his views neatly to Greg Cotton, Chief Operating Officer and General Counsel of Wizards ownership group OnGoal, LLC.
“He can play.”
“[That’s] perhaps the biggest compliment he can pay a player,” said Cotton. “When Peter said that about Sunil, all that was left was working out a contractual arrangement with him and his agents.”
But the story of Chhetri’s signing actually starts long before the player’s first Wizards practice. In fact, it started over a year ago, when Cotton and friend Neel Shah first began discussing ways to engage the Indian population around MLS. Shah had worked for Major League Soccer since 2003 as a manager for the League’s grassroots programming and partnerships. Shah worked with Cotton to bring the MLS Verano program to Kansas City, and the two became friends, even after Shah left MLS for a position with Dentsu Sports, a leading sports marketing agency with an arm based in India.
“[India] is a country that is close to my heart and one whose sporting landscape can benefit from some of the ‘best practices’ developed in the U.S.,” Shah said. “When Dentsu Sports India offered me a position, I jumped at the opportunity.”
As it happened, Shah’s move to India coincided with Vermes’ move from the front office as Technical Director to the field as Head Coach and Manager of the Kansas City Wizards. Vermes set about re-tooling a Wizards roster that had struggled in MLS in 2009, a process that involved evaluations of a great number of players from all parts of the soccer world.
“When Peter Vermes began the deconstruction and reassembly of our roster at the end of 2009, the Wizards had a unique opportunity to think creatively about players,” Cotton said. “I had a candid conversation with Neel and told him that I knew nothing about the football in India other than the fact that there were a couple guys that were good enough to get trials with English Championship clubs. I asked him whether any Indian players would fit into what we were building in Kansas City, and he immediately identified several players that we should look at with Sunil at the top of the list.”
The more Cotton and Shah looked into the possibility of signing Chhetri, the more it made sense. Chhetri had just been denied a British work permit, putting an end to the player’s hopes of playing in the United Kingdom. In addition, Chhetri’s contract with former club Dempo SC allowed for the player to leave the club at any time to trial with foreign teams.
Chhetri had star power, as well; he came with glowing recommendations from Indian National Team coach Bobby Houghton, and had performed well in India’s 2008 AFC Challenge Cup championship campaign. Among Indian soccer fans, Chhetri was widely considered to be the new “face” of the sport in their country.
Things made sense on the business end, as well. According to Shah, the country of India houses 80 million viewers of the English Premier League, despite not having a single Indian player involved with any of the teams.
“India has what it takes to be a soccer nation,” Shah contends. “There is a rich soccer history, raw talent and a profound excitement for the game seen in both urban areas and villages all over the country.”
Cotton agrees.
“The football situation in India reminds me somewhat of the state of the sport in the United States back in 1992,” he said. “It's a country that loves its sport, and if there was a small measure of investment, I believe India will explode with soccer interest. Quite frankly, we want to take some of those 80 million Premiership viewers for MLS.”
From the looks of things, that goal may be within reach. News of Chhetri’s signing became top news in India, as he became just the third player in Indian soccer history to ply his trade outside his home nation.
“While Sunil was getting signed, my colleagues at Dentsu India worked round the clock to leverage news of this development with Indian media across major Indian metros,” Shah said. “Internationally, the announcement alone generated a deluge of over a hundred articles in India over just a few days and the blogs and message boards have been active with positive comments.”
According to Cotton, Shah deserves his fair share of plaudits.
“In many ways he and Dentsu opened our eyes to India – the quality of players, the commercial opportunities, and the need for investment and infrastructure,” he said. “We look forward to a continued relationship with Neel and Dentsu to help execute OnGoal’s strategic plan in India.”
