Last month, the All India Football Federation (AIFF) nominated a highly-experienced coach in Gabriel Joseph for the Dronacharya award, a prestigious sports coaching honour instituted by the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports (MYAS).
Only one football coach has ever won the award since it was started in 1985 - Syed Nayeemuddin in 1990. Gabriel Joseph, who has worked under Nayeemuddin incidentally with the Indian national team, is a behemoth as far as coaching is concerned in the country.
The coach, who hails from Thiruvananthapuram in Kerala, has had a long and distinguished coaching career which started in 1962 and has spanned around 58 years.