By Our Special Correspondent
Indian National Team head coach, Igor Stimac has confirmed that the country's talisman, Sunil Chhetri will return back to the fold for the Blue Tigers upcoming 2023 Asian Cup qualifiers final round scheduled to take place in June.
Chhetri has struggled with injury issues in the recent past and will return back to action after six months, having last played for India during their 3-0 win over Nepal in the SAFF Championships final in October.
Stimac has admitted that he is delighted that the 37-year-old is back to his full fitness and will be the “main force and strength” of the team. “Sunil is still here, he’s still in great shape. We didn’t involve him in Bahrain and Belarus games because he needed time to recover from some minor problems he was facing throughout the last couple of years," he said at a press conference.
“That time has served very well to Sunil. He has recovered very well. He’s showing that on the training pitch every day and still at this point he will be the main force and strength of the Indian national team up front.” Chhetri's return is certainly a boon for the Blue Tigers considering that he is their best player and their record goals scorer with 80 goals from 125 appearances.
India, who is the highest-ranked side (106) in group D, will face Hong Kong (147), Afghanistan (150) and Cambodia (171) in a one-legged final round final round of qualifiers beginning here on June 8. Of course, if we make it if we make three wins, that would be fantastic. That’s what we aiming for. But my aim is to qualify. On Sandesh Jhingan’s availability Stimac said they would monitor the progress of the star India Central defender during ATK Mohun Bagan’s AFC cup group matches beginning on May 18.
The competition in the team is strong. I strongly believe that we have enough quality here and whoever is here we’re going to make our job done, he concluded.
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