A few days following their involvement in a collaborative effort to arrange a meeting with Kalyan Chaubey, the president of the All India Football Federation (AIFF), concerning the ambiguity surrounding the Indian Super League (ISL) season, Odisha FC has suspended the contracts of its players and staff effective Tuesday.
The runners-up of the 2023-24 Super Cup, who have opted out of the current Durand Cup, are the inaugural ISL team to activate the force majeure clause due to the uncertainty surrounding the future of India’s premier football competition.
The communication dispatched to players and staff on Friday indicates that the commencement of the 2025-26 ISL season has been “indefinitely suspended” due to the lack of interest from AIFF’s commercial partners until a new agreement, which will replace the current one expiring this December, is finalized. In light of a Supreme Court remark in April advising that no significant decisions should be made by AIFF until a ruling on the federation’s constitution is issued, negotiations regarding the master rights agreement have been temporarily halted.
“We haven’t shut down the club despite the headlines. Key staff members are retained; our women’s team will be operational. However, it becomes harder to justify to my stakeholders to sink Crs upon Crs with nothings to show for it, and no end in sight.” Club owner Rohan Sharma expressed on ‘X’.
He added, “We have no clarity when the League will start; nowhere to practice/play/work in Odisha, no way to get sponsorship since there’s no season, no way to engage investors with an expiring participation agreement, we hoped something would give, but sadly it hasn’t.
“We didn’t go into this offseason planning to take this step. In fact we had made 5 signings until it became clear things are delayed. We desperately hope the above issues get resolved; maybe doing this will prompt people to fast-track solutions so we can get back to work.” also added Rohan Sharma.
Recently, Sharma stated that the club is uncertain about hosting matches at Bhubaneswar’s Kalinga Stadium due to a lack of communication from the state sports associations. “We are finished with this government in Odisha. It is poorly managed compared to previous administration,” he remarked on X
Odisha FC is among the eight ISL clubs that have reached out to AIFF, requesting a meeting with Chaubey in hopes of contributing to the resolution of this deadlock. According to an official from one of the clubs, they anticipate that a meeting will take place next week. The official, who is not authorized to speak to the media, requested to remain anonymous.
