Ryan Williams, Indian team’s new no. 10 from Perth, makes heads turn

It’s still too early to decide whether the Ryan Williams story can give Indian football hope. However, the Perth-born striker and the team's new no. 10, who struck on his international debut in an Indian shirt in a much needed win against Hong Kong in the final 2027 AFC Asian Cup qualifier in Kochi on Tuesday, has certainly become a newsmaker for followers of the game.

A 2-1 win, the first for the Blue Tigers in a dismal campaign which saw three coaches at the helm, came in a match of only academic interest. After making the cut for two Asian Cups in a row, India floundered this time to end on five points with one win, two draws and three losses as Singapore topped the group with 14 points to earn a ticket to the 2027 showpiece in Saudi Arabia.

Fans had been waiting for Ryan — the 32-year-old who has played for Portsmouth and Fulham in the English Premier League — to make a bow as the first Person of Indian Origin (PIO) as part of a roadmap to improve the country’s football fortunes. The stumbling block to the All India Football Federation's plans was that any such move requires players to give up their overseas passports as India doesn’t allow dual citizenship — and this is where Ryan’s wife motivated him to take the final call.

Reflecting on his move to acquire Indian citizenship, Williams — who joined ISL club Bengaluru FC in 2023 — said: “All of my mum’s family (of Anglo-Indian descent), which is the Indian side of my family, are in Perth. That’s who I grew up with. So, when we went around my nana’s (maternal grandmother's) house, it was always Indian food and loads of uncles, aunties and cousins everywhere. There was always that importance to family, and coming to India and seeing that was kind of like putting two and two together.”

On his decision to acquire an Indian passport — a move which has often deterred many a player in the past — Williams said in an interview: “It came to a point where it was actually my wife who said: Why don’t you just get the passport and let’s stay here. Let’s really push for this. Without my wife, I don’t think this would have happened because at that time, everybody was telling me no, and we just said, Let’s stay. And in the end, perseverance prevailed.”

Williams is a youth product of Portsmouth and also played for top clubs like Barnsley and Perth Glory before moving to India in 2023 and joining ISL. He was close to making his India debut in Dhaka against Bangladesh last November after acquiring his citizenship, but a bueracratic delay in obtaining the No Objection Certificate (NoC) put a spanner in the works.

The debut finally happened in front of passionate Indian fans of Kochi, who welcomed Williams and the Indian team with a passionate rendition of Maa Tujhe Salaam and the overseas star made his bow a memorable one with an early strike. Left back Akash Mishra slipped a second one in in the second half.

“It’s a strange one. I have been having a dream about this one for a long time and done a lot of work to make this happen. You couldn’t write it, (debut) in Kerala, the home of football, scoring in five minutes and winning. That’s the main thing for us. To score means nothing if you don’t win. It’s incredible. It hasn’t fully sunk in yet. We will spend a couple of days enjoying it,” a delighted Williams told AIFF media after India’s victory.

The win saw India claw up five steps in the FIFA rankings to 134 after a terminal decline throughout last year. The question is: can Ryan’s move encourage more of his breed to take the plunge? Only time can tell…