Vishal Kaith, the golden glove winner in the Indian Super League (ISL), was left out of the provisional squad for this month’s Hero Tri-nation International Football Tournament in Imphal which also marks the start of India’s preparations for the Asian Cup finals next year.
Mumbai City FC goalkeeper Phurba Lachenpa though is among the four new faces India head coach Igor Stimac named on Tuesday.
“Phurba has not been part of the national team set-up but Vishal has been with us for two years so we know him and we are not ruling out calling him for the next camp. I wanted to use this opportunity to see how Phurba fits in,” Stimac told HT on Tuesday. Kaith is among the 11 standbys.
Kaith had a wobbly start to the season but goes into Saturday’s ISL final with 12 clean sheets. His save of Javier Saviero’s penalty in the semi-final tie-breaker helped ATK Mohun Bagan make their second final in three seasons. He was adjudged player of the match in Monday’s second leg of the semi-final against defending champions Hyderabad FC.
In 2022, Stimac had kept ISL golden glove winner Prabsukhan Gill in his squad for friendlies against Belarus and Bahrain but started both games with Gurpreet Singh Sandhu.
Bengaluru FC’s Rohit Kumar and Sivasakthi Narayanan, Mumbai City FC’s Mehtab Singh are the other debutants in the 23-player list. The squad will have a five-day training camp here from Wednesday before flying on March 21. Those involved in the ISL final will join on March 19, as per an All India Football Federation media release.
“Since this is a short camp, I did not want to disturb the core of the team. So, I could not call too many new players,” said Stimac.
Myanmar and Kyrgyzstan are the other teams in the three-nation meet that will run from March 22-March 28. These will be India’s first internationals since the 1-1 draw against Singapore and the 0-3 loss to Vietnam last September.
The squad:
Goalkeepers: Gurpreet Singh Sandhu, Phurba Lachenpa , Amrinder Singh.
Defenders: Sandesh Jhingan, Roshan Singh, Anwar Ali, Akash Mishra, Chinglensana Konsham, Rahul Bheke, Mehtab Singh, Glan Martins.
Midfielders: Suresh Wangjam, Rohit Kumar, Anirudh Thapa, Brandon Fernandes, Yasir Mohammad, Ritwik Das, Jeakson Singh, Lallianzuala Chhangte, Bipin Singh.
Forwards: Manvir Singh, Sunil Chhetri, Sivasakthi Narayanan.
Head Coach: Igor Stimac.
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