7 times Indian football team punched above their weight in international tournaments

1960 Rome Olympics

There were 15 spots up for grabs in the 1960 Olympics, as hosts Italy automatically qualified. Out of those 15, two were allotted to Asia. Eight Asian teams were in contention. India faced Afghanistan in the 1st round and easily progressed to round 2, where they faced Indonesia in a two-legged tie, with the winner qualifying for Olympics. India defeated them 6-2 on aggregate and qualified.

The 16 qualified teams were divided into 4 groups of 4 teams each. India were drawn in the tough group D comprising France, Hungary and Peru. Nobody had any expectations from the Indian team, whose line-up was as follows:

Peter Thangaraj (GK), Jarnail Singh, Shaikh Abdul Latif, Mariappa Kempaiah, Menon Chandrasekhar, Chhettri Ram Bahadur, Pradip Kumar Banerjee, Subimal Goswami, Yousuf Khan, Simon Swamidas Sunderraj, Tulsidas Balaraman, Arun Ghosh, Dharmalingam Kannan, Fortunato Franco, Habibul Hamid, Malay Kumar Lahiri, Mundiyath Devadas, Subramaniam Narayan, Syed Shahid Hakim

Coach: Syed Abdul Rahim

Syed Abdul Rahim is probably the greatest Indian coach

India faced Hungary in the first match. Hungary took a 2-goal lead by the 56th minute. But Balaram cut the deficit to half on the 79th minute. India pushed for an equaliser, but it was not to be and the final score remained 2-1 in favour of Hungary.

In the 2nd match, India faced France and took the lead in the 71st minute through a goal from Banerjee. But France struck back in the 82nd minute. The final score remained 1-1. It was a great result for India, considering the opponent.

India's last match was against Peru. This match was inconsequential as only the top team was to progress, and both the teams were out of contention. India lost the match 3-1.

Although India failed to qualify further and remained at the bottom, it was hailed as a better performance than the 4th placed-finish of the 1956 Olympics by many. India faced tough opponents and gave them a great fight. Especially the draw against France was a big achievement.