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Indian National Team Captain Sunil Chhetri expressed his desire of more Indian youngsters needing to train in the European academies where they will get an opportunity to “train with better players in a better league and improve as a player.”
“I just hope a lot of Indian youngsters, if not a few, get a chance to go to these (European) Academies when they are 17-18 years old and still have 4-5 years to improve. They’ll get an opportunity to train with better players in a better league and just improve,” Chhetri stated in a freewheeling to the ISL website.
“When you get an opportunity to play in those academies, you’ll get to know the game in a better way. You’ll get to fine-tune the technicalities, understanding of the game,” he quipped.
Eight years after signing his first professional contract with the Mariners in 2002 when he was 17 years old, Chhetri had his first overseas stint when he signed a professional contract with Sporting Kansas City, in the process becoming the first Indian footballer to earn a professional contract from a Major League Soccer (MLS) club.
“I played two games (for Kansas Sporting City) and came back and they offered me a contract. I went there as a Kansas player and I think I had played 6-7 friendly games,” including a game against Manchester United. “In two games, I scored two hat-tricks and a brace and I thought I’d start for the team. I had a lovely pre-season where I scored 14 goals in 7 games,” Chhetri mentioned.
As the MLS season kicked off, although Peter Vermes, who happens to be the longstanding coach of the club outfit until now, wanted Chhetri to stay with the club, the 25-year-old lad preferred to sacrifice his club contract and join the Indian National Team camp for the-then forthcoming 2011 AFC Asian Cup – Qatar.
“The National Team were up for an 8-month-long camp before the AFC Asian Cup in 2011, I didn’t go for the first few months and when the last 2 months were left, Bob (Houghton) called me saying: “If you’re not starting and playing there right now, you can come.”
“I talked to Peter Vermes and he said: “Listen, you have just come to the team, you’re still in and out. Are you sure you want to do this?” I said: “Yeah, I want to go to the National Team camp.”
In the Continental Championship, Chhetri went on to score one apiece against Bahrain and Korea Republic.
The man with 72 International goals went on to describe his next foreign sojourn with Sporting Lisbon as a “great experience.”
“I went to Sporting Lisbon and it was a great experience for me. Bruma, Eric (Dier), Pedro (Mendes), Joao Mario were there, and they are doing so well around the world right now. I was 26 then and all these kids were 18, 19 and 20 years old,” he continued. “When I came back, I was a more mature person.”
