As India makes way into the second leg of the AFC Asian Cup qualifier play off encounter against Laos, Indian team skipper Sunil Chettri made a point to clarify that what happened in the the first leg was a thing of the past.
"I think we will before the match, think about the last game. If we go into the game thinking the match is over, this might hurt and the game will be different. We're thinking it's just about 0-0, it's a new game and we're going to hope that we will win the game. So, we'll go into the game thinking that it's a new game, we need to try and win the game." Talking about the competition, he said, "We've already played against them (Laos), so we'll figure out and understand how to approach the game. We will go into the game with a formulated plan of how we are to do it. Speaking from the players' side, thinking about what happened in the last game, it doesn't help us in the next game, mentally or physically."
Speaking of the progress Indian football has made since he joined the ranks, he said that while there still was progress being made, there’s still some catching-up left to do to get to the level of the other top sides. "You know, if you see Indian football as the national team, the I-League, and now the ISL and everything, I think we have progressed. Is it good enough? I don’t think so, because we are competing with countries around Asia whose number one, probably the only sport is football. So, they are progressing at a much faster pace. We also have to have that pace, if we are to compete with them. Have we progressed? Yes, we have made progress. But, no matter how much progress we make, it will be less. So, we really have to put our best efforts and we must try and play as well as we can. No matter how much we do, it’ll always be less"
