The Indian football team has moved up by a single place in the updated FIFA Men’s Football Ranking. They moved from 101 to 100 as they entered the top 100 after five long years. The Blue Tigers were once ranked 97 in the world in 2018.
Igor Stimac’s men were at 101 rank in April in the FIFA Men’s Football Rankings. They have now gained 4.24 ranking points which helped them rise up to 100 rank as India are unbeaten in June in the Intercontinental Cup and SAFF Championship.
They have been on a red hot streak ever since they lost to Vietnam 3-0 in the VFF Tri-Nation Series. Since then, they have won seven out of nine games, the only two games they didn’t win were draws against Kuwait in the last match of the SAFF Championship and a 0-0 draw against Lebanon in the last group stage fixture of the Intercontinental Cup. They went on to face them in the finals of the tournament and defeated them 2-0 in the title clash.
Overall Stimac has guided India to two trophies this year, the Tri Nation Series and the Intercontinental Cup. He will be aiming to leave a big mark in the SAFF Championships, which is much more competitive this year with invited teams such as Lebanon and Kuwait playing their role. Both the teams have made it to the semifinals along with India and Bangladesh.
India have scored 15 goals in the nine games after losing to Vietnam and they have also registered a total of nine cleansheets on the bounce which is also a national record for the Blue Tigers. Sunil Chhetri, who scored against Kuwait in their last 1-1 draw, became the joint-highest goal-scorer in the SAFF Championships along with Maldives star Ali Ashfaq. Both the strikers have 23 goals each and with the semifinals against Lebanon coming up on Saturday, the Indian talisman will hope to script a new record in the SAFF Championships.
Kuwait will take on Bangladesh in the other semifinals of the SAFF Championships. While Kuwait dominated proceedings and topped Group A on goals scored, Bangladesh finished second as they won against Bhutan and Maldives but lost to Lebanon.
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