Less than a fortnight before India play their first ever FIFA World Cup game, the All India Football Federation (AIFF) has been forced to deny allegations in the media of player-age violations surrounding the squad for the tournament. A report in The Times Of India on Monday alleged that head coach Luis Norton de Matos was forced to replace "one of the more promising players" in the final squad after an MRI scan rendered him unfit for selection for the World Cup. The AIFF told ESPN the player in question was not selected in the squad, and also said that all those selected fit the age criteria.
FIFA regulations for the U-17 World Cup require players to have been born not before January 1, 2000 and not later than December 31, 2002.
"We got the standard FIFA MRI (Magnetic Resonance Imaging) tests done every five or six months for the entire list of probables, and especially whenever anybody new came into the team," AIFF general secretary Kushal Das told ESPN.
"Before one of our last camps in Bengaluru, we got MRI tests done for all the players and one case was found to be on the borderline. The coach didn't want to take a chance and hence didn't name that player in the final squad."
Das also clarified that all of the 21 players named in the final team have satisfied FIFA's criteria for selection.
Experts say the best available method to determine age is the Tanner-Whitehouse III (TW3) test, one that takes a digital X-ray of the left wrist joint and the lower part of the forearm, and is a standardised way of gauging the bone density of a person. It is nevertheless said to have a margin of error of anywhere between three and six months.
The 2017 edition of FIFA's disciplinary code has explicit rules governing compliance with age limits in tournaments such as the U-17 World Cup. Article 68 of section 9 sets the onus of verifying the age on the national associations and failure to comply with any of the regulations mentioned can invite sanctions from FIFA's disciplinary committee.
Monday's report and several others in the media over the past week have put the spotlight on the age-verification issue in Indian football. ESPN understands there have been three cases of teams being pulled up for age-related offences in 2017 itself, despite the AIFF following its protocol of random testing of players in age-group competitions.
During the 2016-17 U-16 I-League season, Gurgaon-based Conscient FC were disqualified from the Delhi zone after seven of their players were found to have had fake birth certificates. During the national round in Goa, Bengaluru-based Ozone FC were found to have five such players, following which the AIFF had sought to disqualify the team from contesting the semi-finals. Ozone challenged the decision in the Karnataka High Court and obtained a stay order; they played the final in February, when they lost to Minerva Academy.
The third instance involved the Mohun Bagan Academy team in the U-18 I-League in March, which played with a defender suspected of being overage in the zonal stages. The AIFF disciplinary committee decided to ban the team, which had finished top of the table, and also imposed financial penalties on the club as well as the individual player.
The complexity surrounding the age verification issue can be illustrated by the case of one member of the India Under-17 squad (to protect his identity, we are not publishing his name). Though his age according to the AIFF website is within the specified window, there is evidence available on credible online sources of at least two other dates of birth for the same player. He represented his state at the national School Games (U-14) in 2012; the official tournament website has one date of birth, his picture on it has another.
And though the AIFF's Das told ESPN his federation has the right date of birth, the fact that other dates exist in official public websites only shows up the extent of the problem.