Mumbai: A buoyed Indian team will like to win their 10th international encounter on trot when they take on 125th ranked St Kitts and Nevis in their second round robin encounter of the Tri-Nation football tournament here Thursday.
The hosts in the last few months have won eight official international games and an unofficial friendly against Bhutan. In the first match of the ongoing tourney they defeated Mauritius 2-1.
Needing just a draw to win the tournament, India have rested star striker Sunil Chhetri and No.1 goalkeeper Gurpreet Singh Sandhu while Sandesh Jhingan will continue to lead the side.
Going with his ‘blooding youth’ policy, chief coach Stephen Constantine is expected to hand over senior team debut to a few more talented U-23 players after the trio of goalkeeper Amrinder Singh, Nikhil Pujary and Manvir Singh debuted in the opening game.
Addressing reporters here Wednesday, the coach said his side need to start a little bit stronger than the last game.
“We have tendency to start slow and that sometimes causes problem as it did with Mauritius. They got the first goal, even Puerto Rico (in an international friendly last year) got the first goal. We need to come out little bit quicker, that is one of the key areas we are working on,” he pointed out.
Constantine said the good thing about this tournament was having two teams from different continents, who have different philosophy and playing styles.
“St Kitts and Nevis did a good job in containing Mauritius. They (St Kitts and Nevis) are quite dangerous especially on the counter-attack and you could see in the goal (against Mauritius),” Constantine stated.
Asked whether some key players missing from St Kitts and Nevis line-up will make his job easier, the India coach replied in negative.
“It makes my job harder because the players who are here are doing to possibly everything they can to show that they should be here. There will be ISL clubs looking at these games. I would have preferred a fully-loaded (side) here,” Constantine quipped.
Press Trust of India
