Coach Constantine calls for more international friendlies
Four days before they cross swords with Cambodia in an international friendly ahead of their Asian Cup qualifier against Myanmar later this month, India head coach Stephen Constantine called for more international friendlies, stating that such fixtures are instrumental to a team’s consistency before tournaments.
“You hear club coaches complain that they don’t have much time to prepare. So (for the) national team it’s even less,” he said. “There needs to be that level of consistency in the game. We need to understand each other and when you don’t play for one week, one month, it can be a problem. So it’s very important to have an international friendly before a qualifier. It helps gel the boys, try new players, and try new systems or whatever it is that you’re working on.”
The national team’s camp came to an end at the Andheri Sports Complex on Saturday. Speaking on the sidelines after the team’s final practice session, Constantine stressed that the disastrous World Cup qualifying campaign, in which the country ended at the bottom of their group last year, was a stepping stone for the squad to grow.
“In the first round of qualifiers (World Cup), we learnt how to compete. We were not competing against anybody two years back. We couldn’t even beat Nepal.
So in these games we learnt how to compete. We will now have to learn how to qualify,” the British coach said, before adding that he felt a single-league system would help the nation perform better in international tournaments.