Trivandrum: Defending champion Afghanistan will take on host India in the final of the SAFF Championship on Saturday in Thiruvananthapuram. India will be looking for a revenge as they lost to Afghanistan by 2-0 in the 2013 final in Nepal where the winning goals came from Mustafa Azadzoy and Sandjar Ahmadi.
India had a relatively easy outing so far in the tournament but the final would be a different ball game. India defeated Maldives by 3-2 in the semifinal while Afghanistan thrashed SriLanka by 5-0 to book a berth in the final. India has won four of their last six meetings- their only defeat was at the final in 2013.
Afghan coach Segrt spoke highly about his opponents ahead of the final “Both teams are in the final of the tournament to win and it will be a new day for both the teams. The Indian team is very strong and I have the utmost respect on their coach, players and all the staffs. We will not take them lightly.”
Segrt further added “India will make it difficult for us. They have the Players to do so and the crowd will be also cheering for them. This is what matters. The final is what matters. Nobody cares if we won all our games in the group stages. The final is what we came for and we have to win it for the people of Afghanistan.”
Segrt’s counterpart Stephen Constantine also had a lot of respect for the Afghans, “They are a very good side,” only to add: “We will fight from the first to the last minute. If we play at our best and they don’t have a good day, we can win.”
With Robin Singh missing the final, the onus will be on Sunil Chetri to fire in all cylinders. Constantine also agreed a lot will depend on how Chetri perform tomorrow, “Sunil (Chhetri) is an important player as Pritam Kotal, Narayan Das, Arnab Mondal, Augistine Fernandes and all the others including the substitutes. One is useless without the other. If Sunil plays well and others don’t, he won’t get much of the ball. Sunil is a great captain and leader but I never focus on one player.”
Indian defense marshaled by Arnab Mondal and Sandesh Jhingan. They will have to give their best to stop Masih Saighani, Ahmad Hatifie, and Hassan Amin,Faysal Shayeseth from scoring.
On being asked about the vulnerability in Indian defense Constantine answered, “In football, when you are in control of the game, you tend to become a bit sloppy. That’s what happened in the semifinal. And if that happens in the Final, we will have to pay the price.”
Constantine did not want to predict the result, “It’s hard to predict as to which area the match would be decided. It will be decided on all parts of the field. It is going to be a very difficult game. They are a team who can score goals and we need to be careful,” the Indian coach sounds cautious.
The Briton will be banking on the home support to cheer the Indian team, “Since we will be playing at home, I hope the fans cheer behind us and we can use it as an advantage,” he further added.
“Obviously with such a young squad and with such little time to prepare in the Championship, it feels nice to be in the final. We took each game as it came. I want the players in the team to feel competition from who are not in the squad. We now have a group of players who fight and compete for positions.” he stated.
Afghan football team, that is ranked 150, joined the Federation in 2005 but in February 2015, Captain Haroon Amiri said that Afghanistan had officially left the SAFF for the new Central Asian Football Association. So 2015 is the last edition for Afghanistan and they would surely want to finish on a high.
India is the most successful team in the history of the SAFF having won the trophy for six times.
With Inputs from AIFF.