SAFF Championship 2013: India 1-0 Pakistan – Five talking points

India squad’s inexperience evident

While previewing the tournament and India’s first game, Sportskeeda had pointed out the lack of international experience in Wim Koevermans’ squad as only six of the 20 players have 20 or more caps for India. That lack of experience was particularly evident in the performance of two young and yet talented players. Centre back Arnab Mondal was brilliant in the air and brave in the tackles. He also made a couple of important blocks but the East Bengal player was exposed in a couple of one-on-one situations when he got too tight and allowed his man to get past him.

Arnab was also guilty of going for the final tackle on a couple of occasions and will have to quickly learn from his mistakes if he wants to keep his place in the starting eleven. 21-year-old Alywn George is another player whose inexperience was visible. Alwyn started in his natural number 10 role just behind skipper Sunil and did show a couple of nice touches. But overall the youngster failed to get into the game and hardly had any impact. As a result, he was replaced by Jewel Raja at the interval and could lose his place in the starting eleven against Bangladesh.

The performances of Arnab and Alwyn should remind everyone the value of international experience. Koevermans has got a lot of criticism from fans for starting with Gouramangi Singh although the Manipuri hasn’t been in the best of forms at club level. But the 28-year-old had a calming influence on the defence against Pakistan. On a worrying note, any injury to Sunil could see India panic as the alternatives are Robin Singh and Dawson Fernandes who dont even have 10 caps between them while Jeje is being used as a left midfielder.