Referee was too harsh on India today, claims Igor Stimac after AFC Asian Cup exit

India boss Igor Stimac also spoke about India’s goal-scoring woes.

India’s journey at the 2023 AFC Asian Cup came to an end following their 1-0 defeat to Syria in their third group stage game. It was their third defeat following their 2-0 defeat to Australia and the 3-0 loss to Uzbekistan.

The Blue Tigers neither scored a goal nor managed to get a point out of their three group stage fixtures. After the match, India’s head coach Igor Stimac addressed the media and shared his thoughts.

Thoughts on the game

Igor Stimac shared his thoughts on the game and said that Syria deserved the win becasue they were more relaxed and powerful.

“Congratulations to Syria. They deserved it as they were more powerful and relaxed in the final third. It was a good learning experience for us. In three games, we proved that we can compete at this level. Obviously, everybody sees what are the missing points in Indian football.”

He also said that India needs goal-scorers who are confident in front of the goal.

“Scoring goals comes with having good goalscorers in the team, people with confidence in front of the goal. We can take a good lesson from this, good learning and say that in the next edition of the AFC Asian Cup we’re going to be much, much stronger,” he quipped.

On not being able to score a single goal 

When asked about his remarks on his side failing to score a single goal, Stimac said, “The team produced enough chances to score enough goals. You all know in India, why we are not scoring goals at the international level. It will happen when we start having Indian players in the centre forward position. Only then we’re going to have many more goalscorers (to score) for the national team. So, kindly put and raise that question somewhere else not here.”

Jhingan’s Absence

Igor Stimac was quizzed if Sandesh Jhingan’s absence midway through the game made India more vulnerable. He said that India handled the situation very well without Jhingan and that is a very positive point for him as a coach. 

“I think (Rahul) Bheke and Subhasish (Bose) were quite good and confident in everything although Bheke getting booked early into the game didn’t make it easier for him. But, he controlled everything and every situation in a quite satisfying way. So, they handled everything well. It’s a positive point for me as a coach to know that we can handle situations without Sandesh when he’s not there. 

He further added, “I think that was our biggest problem today because we had a clear plan to take the game into 60 minutes with a clean-sheet and to bring on the fresh legs, which I was hoping would give us something and get an impact on this team in the last 30 minutes, which obviously didn’t happen. I think Udanta (Singh) was the only one who came as a substitute and did a few things.

Team Selection

When asked about the frequent changes in the team, Stimac said that the players get rewarded on the basis of their performance, behaviour and efforts during training sessions.

“The players, whatever they get is what they deserve. It’s a simple philosophy which I have. We cannot credit players for what’s been done in the game five days ago. I follow my players day-by-day, on a daily basis by watching their body language, their behaviour. I want competition in my team in each position every minute, every second of the day.” 

He also spoke about Liston Colaco’s absence and said that he wasn’t fit enough to play after being down with fever for two days.

“I don’t want people to be casual, relaxed and similar because that will not take us anywhere. I feel sorry for Liston because he had the fever a few days back for a couple of days and I wouldn’t be serious as a coach to expose him so much.

“We have many young boys here and many of them are knocking on the door of the national team. In future, everything will depend on their performance in the clubs and that will be the main reason (criterion) for selecting the players for the national team,” he asserted.

Refereeing Decisions

The head coach was asked about his thoughts on the refereeing decisions. He replied and said that the referee was too harsh on India.

“I think that the referee was too harsh on India today. You cannot sanction each contact made by India and not sanction the other side. Our centre-back got booked today for a simple foul and the other day we have seen people get knocked in the face with a boot. Here we saw today also hitting a player off the ball. It’s a red card. That kind of behaviour is a red card.” 

He also mentioned that the referees need to allow the game to go on with tackles and excitement and not so soft decisions.

“I love this criteria which allows the game to go on. Let’s not be soft and teach these players that this is a strong sport. We need to see tackles and excitement, but some referees are not sticking to that. I think that the wrongest thing for one referee is to have double criteria. If you start wrong, finish on the wrong foot all game. Simple as that, but just keep the same level of criteria throughout 100 minutes,” he signed off.

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