Sunil Chhetri-led Indian team is set to take on one of its biggest assignments in 2024 in the month of January. The team will be playing the AFC Asian Cup, being held in Qatar, after being postponed for a year.

This is expected to be a tough campaign for India having been drawn into an extremely tough group, which has the likes of Australia, Syria and Uzbekistan. India head coach, speaking right before the tournament, said that India were rank outsiders in the group an their main goal was to go through to the third round of the 2026 World Cup Qualifiers.

India Squad for AFC Asian Cup

Speaking to PTI on Sunday, 31 December, Stimac said that all three oppositions were extremely strong and the team closest to India’s ranking (Syria) were tricky in nature.

“Obviously, we are rank outsiders in our group. Uzbekistan is one of the dark horses and a fantastic team, their players’ physicality could cause problems,” Stimac told PTI in an interview.

“Australia are playing at the highest level of football and we all know what they are capable of… they are regular at World Cups and will mostly clear the group stage there,” Stimac further added.

India landed in Qatar’s capital on Saturday for the tournament much later than the other teams who are participating in the tournament. The same happened with the Indian team during the Asian Games 2023 as well after their flight got delayed. India however, put in a brave show but were knocked out from the group stage. Speaking about the preparation in the current tournament, Stimac said that the Indian team needed to be stable.

“This group is much stronger than the last Asian Cup. The most important thing for us is to have a good performance and ensure that we remain stable and in shape while playing. I am not putting any pressure on players about results,” the head coach said.

“We need to find stability, we will try to play fearless football notwithstanding the teams we play against. I don’t mind the final results. Our final goal is to qualify for the third round of World Cup qualifiers,” concluded the coach.

While this will be India’s fifth appearance in the AFC Asian Cup, the Blue Tigers have never made it past the group stage after finishing runners-up in 1964, which was played in a round-robin format.

India will begin their campaign against Australia on January 13 followed by matches against Uzbekistan on January 18 and Syria on January 23.