in whatever fields there are and in street corners." Karim's son, Tushar, eight, wants to be a cricket player and hopes to be part of the national team when he grows up.

The love for cricket in Bangladesh is not unexpected, though. The country has had a very few successes in international sports. In1997, Bangladesh national cricket team was the ICC Trophy champion and played their first World Cup match in 1999.

In football, however, Bangladesh's track record has remained pathetic for the last 15 years. Back in 1986, there was a ray of hope that Bangladesh would qualify for the World Cup, when the national football team had beaten Indonesia and Thailand. But since then, wins in internationals have been hard to come by. And no longer is there so much euphoria surrounding matches between Abahani and Mohammedan, arch rivals in the local football.

When such is the condition of football in Bangladesh, one event has given the game a boost enough to change the trend: it is Zinedine Zidane's visit to Bangladesh taking place on the night of 6th November. The football magician is not only France's hero; he is one of the world's most celebrated stars, who became a total sensation for Bangladeshis this year as soon as their favorites Brazil and Argentina were knocked out in the World Cup.

Zinedine Zidane was here only for two days and most of his engagements were more to do with promoting Danone, a French food-processing company, for which he is the Brand Ambassador, and visiting a Grameen Bank project along with Nobel Laureate Professor Muhhamad Yunus to see the role of the project first-hand.

Although his association with football on the tour was for a short time-a casual match with some children in the village and his participation in a friendly under-16 match between Abahani and Mohammedan-people in Bangladesh thronged the stadium to watch him play. More than 25 million fans watched him on television.

Zidane has ignited the old passion and has reminded us that deep inside our hearts we still nurture our love for football. What we need is to see some better performance from Bangladeshi football teams.

As for any football team, the importance of having an efficient coach can hardly be emphasized. Recently Diego Andres Cruciani from Argentina has taken the charge of the Bangladesh national football team. Before him Bangladesh national team had nine different foreign coaches.

Samir Shakir had some success as a foreign coach of the Bangladesh national team. He led the team to their dream title victory in the Nepal South Asia Federation (SAF) Games in 1999 but he left soon after the triumph. Then came Englishman George Harrison but he too left the country after only two months. Bangladesh Football Federation (BFF) ultimately managed another new coach Austrian George Kottan, who guided Bangladesh to South Asian Football Federation Cup to seize the Champion trophy in 2003. Thereafter Bangladesh football was without a coach for almost two and a half years and as a result football performance fell drastically.

So, Cruciani's arrival happens at a crucial time for Bangladesh. In the meantime, certain initiatives have been taken which are expected to improve the quality of football of Bangladesh. Vision Asia programme is looking into restructuring Bangladesh's domestic league as well as initiating more youth programmes. Another piece of good news is The Canary Wharf Youth Football Academy, supported by Emirates Group, sent East London coach Anthony Ferguson to Bangladesh to begin a nationwide hunt for under-14 stars.

Whether Bangladeshis see more of Zidane or not in the future, the passion he has rekindled in Bangladeshis should be kept alive.

This means BFF should take some solid measures. One would be to create a long-term plan beginning with searching young talents and giving them the necessary trainings for the next few years. At the same time vigorous campaigns should be launched to promote football in Bangladesh.

This will require money and BFF will do well to invite large private companies to take up joint promotional activities such as sponsoring teams and events. Already, a number of leading corporations in Bangladesh have taken up similar projects to promote cricket in the country.

In the past, BFF and the National Team Management Committee (NTMC) found it difficult to agree on various issues, including selection of national team officials. They must avoid squabbles and ...