Indian men’s football team have climbed up four places in the FIFA Men’s Football Ranking to be placed at 102 in the world. This is courtesy of their wins against Myanmar and Kyrgyz Republic in the Tri National tournament and also exceptional performances in the Asian Cup qualifiers where the Blue Tigers remained undefeated in the three matches against Hong Kong, Afghanistan and Cambodia.
Apart from the wins, Igor Stimac’s men have shown good improvement in their style of play. Indian wingers now look a lot more comfortable with the ball and their gameplay has improved drastically. Now their movement and passing always has an intention which is to score goals and threaten the opposition.
With the win against Kyrgyz Republic, India lifted the Tri Nation tournament trophy. Sandesh Jhingan scored the opening goal for India against Kyrgyz whereas Sunil Chhetri created history from the spot to score the second. It was Chhetri’s 85th international goal as he surpassed Hungarian legend Ferenc Puskas. He is now the fifth highest goalscorer in international football.
India’s only goal against Myanmar was scored by Anirudh Thapa.
India’s best ever rankings is 94th in the world and it was achieved back in 1996. Recently courtesy of some splendid performances and the leadership of Stephen Constantine, India broke into the top 100 rankings in the world. But overall it has been difficult for them to sustain it for long.
Also Stimac’s style of play was different and the players needed time. Hence they lost some matches which they should have won. However things look a lot better now. With the team set to play in another AFC Asian Cup, this time they will aim for the knockouts with their might after they lost out in the last edition.
The rise in FIFA rankings will be beneficial for India as the draws for the Asian Cup will take place on 11th May. Team rankings wil be used while determining pot division. So Stimac’s men will hope to get an edge over there as they will used the next FIFA Rankings update which reportedly should be out of April 6. It will be interesting to see in which pot India ends up finally.
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