In what is more good news for the Indian football fan, Spanish league leaders and Champions League finalists Atletico Madrid have agreed to visit India during August to kick start the preparations for the Kolkata franchise of the Indian Super League (ISL), named Atletico de Kolkata.
The above was confirmed to The Times of India by one of the franchise’s stakeholders Harshvardhan Neotia. In addition to this, the team is expected to be coached by a former Atletico player and players of the ISL franchise will travel to Madrid to train at the club’s facilities.
Atletico Madrid aims to set up an academy in India with a view that some of its graduates will go on to play for the club sometime later in the future.
“When you invest money,you also need a proper structure. This is why we are looking at the prospect of setting up an academy here,by involving our own technical staff.We have come to join hands with Kolkata to promote our brand in India, but our objective is also to give Indian football a structure which can help improve the standard of the game here and get them back to where they once belonged on the global stage,” said Emilio Gutierrez,the clubs director of marketing and international relations.
The tournament is expected to take place between September and November of this year.
