SAFF Championship 2013: It wasn’t our night – India’s Francis Fernandes

Despite India’s failure to retain the SAFF Championship and complete a hattrick of titles, one player stood out and cemented his place in the national team. That player is versatile wide midfielder Francis Fernandes, who was consistent throughout and his absence due to injury was felt in the group game against Nepal which India lost 2-1. Francis though remains modest and is still keen for improvement.

“Was it my best tournament for the national team? Maybe. But we won the Nehru Cup so that was more special I guess and I still have to improve a lot at international level,” the Salgaocar man told Sportskeeda after the game.

India created more chances in the final against Afghanistan but poor finishing cost them dearly and Francis believes it just wasn’t meant to be for his team.

“It just wasn’t our night. We had plenty of chances and it was perhaps our best performance of the tournament. We didn’t have the luck at all otherwise we could have easily won tonight,” he said.

The failure to win the South Asian crown will not go down well with the fans back home but Francis remained optimistic about the future of the national team.

“There are still plenty of positives to take from the tournament. We just have to keep working hard and give absolutely everything in the next international assignment,” he said.