Stephen Constantine is used to the underdog tag. The Indian football national team coach, presently in charge of the India U-23 team, doesn’t mince words when he says his main focus is to produce fine talent than qualify for the AFC U-23 Championship.
Constantine and his boys are in Doha for the AFC U-23 Championship qualifiers, where they will battle with hosts Qatar, Syria and Turkmenistan for a place in the main event in China next year.
Only group winners will qualify automatically, with the five best runners-up across all groups also making it through. But Constantine knows what is in front of him and his boys and says he prefers the ‘long-term goals’ rather than churn out quick results.
“I’ve been a person who have always preferred to build a team for the future. I’m working with this bunch of guys so that a few may come up the ranks and land up with the senior national team in the coming days,” said Constantine ahead of his team’s Group C opener against Syria today at Al Sadd stadium.
Unlike in Qatar, where the Under-23 teams play plenty of matches home and away in preparation for the big tournaments, Constantine only had three weeks to assemble the team. A proposed tour to United States was cancelled and they had to contend with two friendly matches against Singapore, in which they won one and lost another.
Unlike Syria, who appeared at the 2014 and 2016 U-23 finals, India are yet to progress further than the qualifiers. And Constantine was keeping the expectations to bare minimum.
“There will be difficult matches for us over the next five days, but these are the games you want to play. We will give everything we have and hopefully we can get some positive results,” he said.
The Englishman has been the bedrock of Indian football in his two stints. Under Constantine’s tutelage, India have risen to 96th spot in the FIFA rankings, which is their best in the last two decades.
India were ranked 171 when Constantine took over for the second time in February 2015 but under the 54-year-old there has been meteoric rise. Still more needs to be done, especially at the age-group level, says the Indian senior coach.
“India’s FIFA ranking doesn’t have anything to with Under-23 level. It’s a completely different aspect,” said Constantine as a matter of fact. “The reason India doesn’t do well at U-23 level is because we don’t give importance to age groups as we should. In the league we don’t have too many U-23 players.
“We have players with us here who don’t have teams. We have some players who have played just maybe 5-6 games the whole season,” the Englishman, who has also coached Sudan, Malawi, Rwanda and Nepal national teams, noted.
“So if you don’t give importance to these age groups, then we won’t qualify for the major tournaments. This time we have assembled the boys barely three weeks ago. There are players with whom I have not worked before. So it will be very difficult for our players against bigger teams. From this group I expect one or two players to come into the national team and that will be the objective,” Constantine added.
The weather in Qatar has been extremely hot throughout but that hasn’t bothered Constantine much. “I don’t think the weather will be a problem. It has been hot in India and we are physically ready for the games,’’ he stated.
India have two or three players to watch out for in the tournament. One such player is forward Lalianzuala Changte. The teen sensation from Mizoram, having trained at Liverpool’s youth academy at Kirkby, made his mark, when aged 18, he became the second youngest Indian to score in an international match against Nepal in the SAFF Championship in 2015.
Changte has already made four appearances for the senior side and has drawn comparisons with the Indian great Baichung Bhutia. Top scorer in his debut season in the U-19 I-League, Changte did, though, suffer a setback with the national side when they failed to qualify for the 2016 AFC U-19 Championship in Qatar.
However, with football on the rise in India – headlined by the upcoming FIFA U-17 World Cup the nation will host in October– a new star to lead the beautiful game’s revolution is needed: Changte could be that man.
India’s 23-member squad
Goalkeepers: Vishal Kaith, Kamaljit Singh, Sukhadev Patil
Defenders: Salam Ranjan Singh, Lalruatthara, Jerry Lalrinzuala, Davinder Singh, Nishu Kumar, Sairuathkima, Sarthak Golui, Kamalpreet Singh Grewal
Midfielders: Anirudh Thapa, Nikhil Poojari, Nandha Kumar, Germanpreet Singh, Mawihmingthanga, Vinit Rai, Robinson Singh, Lallianzuala Changthe
Forwards: Hitesh Sharma, Alen Deory, Manvir Singh, Daniel Lalhlimpuia.
India coach Stephen Constantine.
