Indian record goal scorer Sunil Chhetri remains an irreplaceable part for the team feels head coach Igor Stimac as the former Croatian defender referred Indian captain as ‘valuable’ to his side.
Currently the second highest international goal scorers among active players, only behind Portugal’s Cristiano Ronaldo (99), Chhetri is the most-capped player and also the all-time top scorer for the Indian national team, with 72 goals in 115 appearances.
The 35-year-old forward has been in prolific form in 2019 as well scoring seven goals in 11 games but since netting India’s only goal in the 1-2 loss to Oman in September, he has not found the target in the last three matches of the 2022 World Cup qualifying campaign.
And on Thursday when asked if he (Stimac) has found any player in India who can replace Chhetri in the future, he said, “I am trying to do everything possible so that Sunil keeps scoring goals. You are all mentioning replacing Sunil, I don’t know why you saying that. He is not going anywhere. He is there, alive and fit and doing his best in to keep scoring goals.”
“He had some great chances if you remember one in the game against Afghanistan, which normally he scores nine out of ten times. It didn’t happen that day but that doesn’t mean something has changed in his game.”
“He is very valuable to us, his body is like 29-year old, so as long as he is training like he is, behaving like he is and giving his best to the national team he will be with us, I can assure you about that,” Stimac said of his team’s captain.
However, the coach said that the current team also has players who can score goals and he is hopeful of them stepping up and getting the job done for India.
“But I hope at the same time that I will have chance to find out few more like Sunil Chhetri, I hope that once Jobby Justin starts playing games, he will start scoring goals, so I can have him in the national team. I hope a few other players like Seiminlen Doungel from FC Goa will start playing in centre-forward position in few games and Manvir Singh start scoring goals. So we have different options because they are a different kind of players. I am very excited about all that,” he added.