Sandesh Jhingan on recovery, missing games for national team Asian Cup preparations & more

Sandesh Jhingan spoke ahead of India’s clash against Malaysia.

Almost 10 months since last playing for the Indian national team at the AFC Asian Cup in January, Sandesh Jhingan is finally back with the Blue Tigers after recovering from his anterior cruciate ligament injury.

Describing the recovery journey as a mix of emotions – regret, anxiety, belief and whatnot – the 31-year-old center-back feels the same motivation as a young player about to make his debut. His actual debut was in 2015, and the friendly against Malaysia would be his 64th cap.

When the national team goes an entire year without one of their most reliable and consistent players of the past decade, it feels like a big miss. Gurpreet Singh Sandhu labeled Jhingan’s comeback as not just the return of a key player but a friend and a leader in the camp.

Speaking from the national team camp in Hyderabad, Jhingan opened up about the arduous 10 months, regret of missing out on playing for the country, mental strength and the prospect of qualifying for the third successive AFC Asian Cup.

Q. Sandesh, first of all, welcome back to the national team. How does it feel?

Sandesh Jhingan: Grateful. I feel pure happiness. Sometimes people use this word very lightly. It’s pure happiness and gratitude. I’m motivated. There are a lot of emotions and a lot of work behind getting back in the national team. So yeah, just happy to be here. Pure happiness, I would say.

Q. It’s been almost 10 months since you last played for India in the Asian Cup. What’s your recovery journey been like? If you could condense these 10 months into a few words.

SJ: Again, a mix of emotions. Of course, when it happens, you feel sad, you feel upset. Because you let the country down, you let your club down. So that was the initial feeling. Then the fear of the surgery, a little bit of optimism in between, thinking you can just carry on for two or three months more and then play those important games because we were in a very crucial part with the national team and at my club level.

So I was trying to push again, to keep going for another two or three months. But it came to a moment where it became too risky. That feeling was there post-surgery when the doubt and the anxiety came. Then you start walking, then you start jogging and then some motivation comes in again. The pain and the swelling come and again the doubts resurface.

It was full of fixed emotions but all in all, the whole credit to my comeback, and I’m not just saying it for the sake of it, I’m being very honest. 90 to 95% of the credit goes to the people who were around me at that time. Starting from my teammates on the national team, national team physiotherapist Gigy George, at my club, Russell (Pinto) was there, the doctor who operated on me, the coaching staff of the national team and the club and my family.

They all made it possible and they deserve all the credit. I just did maybe five percent of it. That’s why I say I’m very grateful for the people around me and that’s the beauty of humanity, it’s the people who make you. And yeah, that was it and I never let it put me down.

Q. We played a lot of crucial matches this year where we missed your presence. I’m sure you must have been watching every game at home. What’s that feeling like? Is there sort of a regret? I wish I were there kind of feeling.

SJ: Of course you regret it. There’s no denying that. The first feeling that comes is that you let everyone down. I’ve been with the boys like Gurpreet, Amrinder, Manvir, everyone, playing together for many, many years. You form that bond in every battle, in every game, you go in together.

And then when you’re not there, you kind of feel you let your teammates down, you let the coaching staff down. But then it’s just, that’s football, you know. I won’t lie, after the June game (against Qatar), I was on a balcony alone and I was quiet for a few minutes and I just thought… That’s football.

Q. Let’s talk about mental strength. You’ve suffered and recovered from quite a few injuries in your career. You once said you broke your ankle when you were 17. You had an ACL in Kerala Blasters also. You had injury problems during your stint in Croatia also. And now this recent ACL. How do you treat these setbacks in life? How important is mental strength when you suffer physically?

SJ: I’ll tell you what mental strength is. Just go around your town and walk on the streets. There you will see what real pressure is, what people have to go through to put food on the table. That’s real mental strength. What I do, mostly all athletes, have our struggles, but I don’t call this mental strength.

This is part of the job. If I cry about my situation, of course, it’s tough, I’m not taking it away. What I do is just part of my job. Your work is your religion. So I try to do it with full honesty and passion. But I just cannot fathom the idea that we or I have a strong mental strength. I’m just a random guy who’s living his dream. Mental strength is the day-to-day life.

Q. Let’s talk about the future now. Our sole focus is to qualify for the Asian Cup for the third successive time. We have been playing a lot of quality opponents recently and Malaysia will be another one. How are the preparations? What do we expect from this game, and how will this help us ahead of next year’s Asian Cup Qualifiers?

SJ: First of all, it’s good you highlighted the importance of it. At least people now understand the importance of being at the Asian Cup regularly, not only keeping the idea that we want to be at the World Cup, the stage of your ultimate dream. And I’ve said it before also, 10 years ago when I made my debut, most of us here knew that the ultimate goal is being regulars at the Asian Cup, and we’ve done it in the last two editions. We are the first team/batch to go to consecutive Asian Cups. So now going in the third one will be another big step for us.

The atmosphere in the team is brilliant. And we all know the importance of these friendlies because from now till March we don’t play any other international game. So we know we need to get a good result. But the whole point – because we have a new coaching staff, there’s a new philosophy, a new system, a new style- is that it takes time to implement.

People kind of get bored hearing the word “takes time”. But it takes time. Everything takes time to develop. If it develops very fast, it’s not gonna last long. So, one of the main objectives in this game will be, if you look at the last three games, each game we’ve improved as a team. So our target is to do one step better, do a much better game than against Vietnam.

And then after this, we’ll go back to our clubs but we’ll get an idea from here about what we need to be prepared about, individually to be ready for selection and to help the team in March because those are the main games. Get three points, get the clean sheet, give an honest performance and make the country proud. That’s the thing.

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