India's new football captain has been announced for the do or die clash against Qatar on June 11. Sunil Chhetri called it quits after the previous game against Kuwait which ended in a draw and India will now have to play without him against Qatar. Meanwhile, his successor, at least for a game, has been named goalkeeper Gurpreet Singh Sandhu and he will lead India at Jassim bin Hamad Stadium and will commence at 9:15 PM IST.
The 23-member squad for the massive encounter has also been named by the head coach Igor Stimac. Apart from Chhetri who is retired now, defenders Amey Ranawade, Lalchungnunga and Subhasish Bose have been left out and accordingly, they didn't travel to Qatar with the team. Moreover, Bose has been released from the squad on the request from the player due to personal reasons.
Speaking of the new captain, Stimac stated that there was never a doubt that Sandhu would take over from Chhetri. "Gurpreet was one of our captains alongside Sunil and Sandesh (Jhingan) for the past five years, so naturally he is the one to take responsibility at this moment," he said.
Opening up about the changes in the squad, he added, "I was happy to have both of them (Ranawade and Lalchungnunga) with us. We worked on various aspects of their game for the future. We had a nice talk before we released them and they know which parts of their game they need to grow for the upcoming season. I hope both of them will use the time ahead to improve and come back stronger."
As far as the qualification chances are concerned, India are still not completely out of the qualifiers and will make it to the third round if they beat Qatar who are coming off the draw game against Afghanistan. Qatar have named a youthful squad for this game having already qualified for the third round.
