group of death for us I mean.. s.korea , australia and bahrain was really tough for us. Hope this time atleast one team will be there which will be easier to match.
SC had a lot of Continental Cup matches at his disposal for this improvement in ranking. India used to be ranked >150 mainly because we used to bow out of World Cup qualifiers in the first round itself and leaving no Asian level matches at our disposal.
Friendlies can only earn 1/3rd points of what a single win in such continental cups can. He was lucky if you ask me.
It has been a long journey. Asia Cup is in January 2019. We played our first qualifier in March 2015 - 2-0 victory against Nepal in Guwahati. Once Asia Cup finish, the same cycle will start again from March 2019. So it is good that we will have continued international matches participation which IMG-Reliance cannot sabotage.
Can't we ever organize a couple of friendlies against any of the Far East or Middle East or East European countries to assess ourselves ? Why always we have Nepal as our major opponent in a friendly ? Also it is interesting to find Iraq, Thailand & host of other powerful Footballing Nations below us.
It is hard to be happy about this when you see other "fans" start cheering and saying how Indian football is getting better tenfold when we know that that isn't the case and that any game against any team ranked around us would bring us back down to earth.
Comments
SC had a lot of Continental Cup matches at his disposal for this improvement in ranking. India used to be ranked >150 mainly because we used to bow out of World Cup qualifiers in the first round itself and leaving no Asian level matches at our disposal.
Friendlies can only earn 1/3rd points of what a single win in such continental cups can. He was lucky if you ask me.
Far East or Middle East or East European countries to assess ourselves ? Why always we have Nepal as our major opponent in a friendly ?
Also it is interesting to find Iraq, Thailand & host of other powerful Footballing Nations below us.