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The Indian Under-22 national team in their second match of the 2018 AFC U-23 Championship – Group C qualifiers suffered their second loss, this time an unlucky one against the hosts Qatar at the Al Sadd Stadium in Doha, Qatar on Friday evening.
India coach Stephen Constantine made six changes to his starting eleven with Nishu Kumar, Lalruatthara, Nikhil Poojary, Germanpreet Singh, Daniel Lalhimpuia and Manvir Singh being replaced by Davinder Singh, Sarthak Golui, Vinit Rai, Lallianzuala Chhangte, Hitesh Sharma and Alen Deory.
Salam Ranjan Singh also took over the captain’s armband from Lalruatthara in his absence.
The newly put together India side were after the ball for most of the first session, but Qatar didn’t get through to the defensive line too often. At the break it was goalless.
The winner for Qatar came in the 54th minute as a long ball could not be collected by Vishal Kaith as an alert Al Moaaz Ali places the ball perfectly into the net beating two Indian defenders.
In the final quarter of the game India woke up, came out of their shell and put the tiring Qataris under pressure. First a Lallianzuala Chhangte cross was smacked to the woodwork by Manvir Singh and then headed over by Nikhil Poojary in the 79th minute, then following a corner Sarthak Golui’s header had to be saved by the Qatari keeper, Daniel Lalhlimpuia’s long ranger caused problems before deep in injury time Anirudh Thapa’s effort few over.
The game ended 1-0 in favour of hosts Qatar with the India Juniors giving the Qataris a real fight especially in the last quarter of the match, where they came close on numerous occasions to score. India next face Turkmenistan on Sunday, July 23 in what would be the final game of the qualifiers for the Junior Men in Blue.
INDIA U-22: 1-Vishal Kaith – 22-Davinder Singh, 4-Salam Ranjan Singh [C], 21-Sarthak Golui, 18-Jerry Lalrinzuala – 15-Nandha Kumar (77′ 7-Nikhil Poojary), 19-Anirudh Thapa, 8-Vinit Rai, 14-Lallianzuala Chhangte – 11-Hitesh Sharma (82′ 10-Daniel Lalhlimpuia), 12-Alen Deory (70′ 9-Manvir Singh)
