All areas are an issue, says Indian soccer coach Igor Stimac

Igor Stimac sounded optimistic, as he at all times does. But it felt extra like an SOS name to these answerable for Indian soccer.The chief coach was requested if the nationwide workforce lacked a high quality central defender to companion Sandesh Jhingan, who’s taking part in membership soccer in Stimac’s homeland, Croatia. Stimac didn’t miss an open aim.
“Not only central defence, all areas are a problem for us,” he stated. “With pandemic going around, we have a season that won’t last for eight-nine months. That’s the biggest problem for Indian football. Working like this, where players come to the national team during offseason, it’s terrible.”
Stimac was spot on along with his prognosis of the principle drawback dealing with Indian soccer – the flawed home construction. But it isn’t simply due to the pandemic. The outbreak of Covid-19 final 12 months may need delayed the All India Football Federation’s (AIFF) plans to have an extended season, however it’s not a current drawback.
For nearly a decade, the unnaturally brief home season has hindered participant improvement, which has had a cascading affect on the nationwide workforce.
The Indian Super League (ISL), the nation’s premier division, lasts for under 4 months, making it one of many shortest on the earth. This is because of a number of components however primarily business. The new season, for example, will begin subsequent month and finish in March 2022 after which till the following season begins – in November, going by the current pattern – the gamers can have nothing to do other than taking part in in an odd match in between.
This has put India’s footballers at a large drawback in comparison with the others, a lot in order that even the nations from South Asia, like Bangladesh who’ve a correct full season, are beginning to hassle the world’s 107th-ranked workforce. At the recently-concluded South Asian Football Championship, which India gained after huffing and puffing their manner via the preliminary matches, this was evident.
Stimac stated he didn’t take into account the SAFF title to be a ‘special success’ however praised the gamers for his or her ‘togetherness, energy, positive attitude and great mindset.’ But wasn’t too happy that the few days he bought with the workforce earlier than the Cup was spent engaged on their health, quite than the tactical points of the sport.
“We had certain problems in the beginning because we did not have enough preparation compared to other teams. Nepal had two-and-a-half months to prepare. We had only 7-8 days prior to the tournament. Half of the team was without proper competition mode and fitness… Soon, we will have a normal season like in other countries. We want to get to top 10 in Asia and (for that) we need to have the same quality of league as in the other countries,” Stimac stated in a media interplay.
The Asian Football Confederation, it’s learnt, has given the AIFF time until subsequent 12 months to extend the variety of matches golf equipment play every season, which might robotically enhance the size of the season. If the federation fails to take action, India may lose its Asian Champions League spot.
If China can’t can India?
Stimac cited the instance of China to reveal how robust the trail shall be for India to match different Asian nations earlier than dreaming about qualifying for the World Cup. “China has been spending more than a billion dollars per year in football development. Millions of children in academies, thousands and thousands of foreign coaches, getting foreign players to play for their national team, and still, it’s not enough (for them to qualify for the World Cup),” he stated. “We are dreaming about going to World Cup one day. It’s a huge, massive process because we are not the only ones dreaming about it. Other countries are doing more (than us) in terms of quantity of investments, grassroots, foreign coaches at academies, coaching licensing…”
India’s file beneath Stimac hasn’t been notably spectacular however the Croat wasn’t too involved about it. His process, Stimac stated, was to ‘reconstruct’ the nationwide workforce by making the gamers play technically stable soccer and enhance the bench energy.
The course of, he underlined, would contain ‘suffering’, by way of outcomes however he was happy with the progress the workforce has made beneath him.
“The only result in which we did not fulfill expectations was against Bangladesh at Salt Lake (1-1 draw). But then, apart from two matches, we could not play our other qualifying matches at home and still, we qualified for the third round,” he stated. “From this stage now on, we can go one step further which will be playing good football in the third round of qualifiers and making sure India qualifies for Asian Cup.”

That, once more, shall be difficult. The third spherical of qualifiers, which shall be India’s last probability to qualify for the 2023 Asian Cup in China, begins in February 2022.
According to FIFA guidelines, golf equipment should launch their gamers for 4 days for nationwide workforce duties on dates earmarked for such video games. The Asian Cup qualifiers, nevertheless, shall be performed exterior the same old FIFA window, which may result in a tussle between the membership and a nationwide workforce. Stimac stated it was vital to ensure the dates of the qualifying matches are thought of ‘a part of the ISL calendar so that the players are released for national team duty.’
“If we are going to succeed in this qualifier which are games to play outside FIFA window, we need to sit down with other stakeholders in domestic competitions (read ISL), how much time the national team players will get for preparation,” he stated. “Otherwise, we are going to gamble, as simple as that.”