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The Igor Stimac-led Indian Men’s National Football Team are all set to start their South Asian Football Federation (SAFF) Championship 2021 campaign against Bangladesh on Monday, October 4.
Given that India have named a near-full strength squad for the tournament, Head Coach Igor Stimac was asked if that would mean there is added pressure on the side since they are also the highest ranked side in the tournament. He had the following to say:
“I don’t think about pressure, I don’t feel any pressure and I don’t want our players to feel any pressure because that’s limiting their capacities when the important time comes on the pitch.”
Addressing the fact that he had named a full senior squad as compared to the under-23 squad that they sent to Bangladesh for the 2018 edition of the SAFF Championship, Stimac pointed out that this was the side’s last chance to come together before the third round of the AFC Asian Cup qualification. He added:
“We have a full squad available here only for one reason: this is the last chance before the third round of qualifiers (AFC Cup qualification) starts for our team to get together. After this we have under-23 qualifiers in Emirates, that’s all. We won’t see each other till February, when we start the third round of qualifiers.”
“For obvious reasons, we now rely mostly on Bengaluru and ATKMB players” - Igor Stimac
Owing to their participation in the AFC Cup in recent months, both Bengaluru FC and ATK Mohun Bagan have begun their pre-season earlier than the others. Igor Stimac acknowledges that this could prove to be a blessing since these players already have some minutes under their belt now. It, of course, also helps that these teams played their AFC Cup group stage games in the Maldives National Stadium in Male, where the SAFF Championship is happening this year.
Responding to a question posed by Sportskeeda, Stimac had the following to say:
“Absolutely, it helps you know. For obvious reasons, we now rely mostly on Bengaluru and ATK players. Not only did they play here a few weeks ago but they started work with their respective clubs and they have enough training sessions and games in their legs so their engines are good for such a tournament, which is not the case with others.”
Just how much the prior acclimatisation of a sizable part of their squad helps Stimac's side remains to be seen. With India playing their first game of the campaign on Monday, the answer to that question is not too far away.
