Stimac hopeful of doing great things for Indian football

New Delhi, May 24: Newly-appointed head coach Igor Stimac said he was optimistic of doing "great things" for Indian football.

"As I've been involved in developing players in Croatia, I see this as a great chance to help the AIFF in organising and developing young talents who're coming up.

"There're many young players knocking on the door of the senior team and I see a great chance to keep improving the team and get results. I'm happy with the quality I've seen and together, we can do great things," the Croat said in his first press conference since assuming charge as the Blue Tigers' coach.

🗣️A strong dream leads to strong beliefs, and a good future for #IndianFootball, @stimac_igor 🙌💪

Read more👉https://t.co/6KE9eQ67py#BackTheBlue #IndianFootball #BlueTigers pic.twitter.com/eXQ6HZzRii

— Indian Football Team (@IndianFootball) May 24, 2019

The 51-year-old added that all players, including the talismanic Sunil Chhetri, are equal and will have to fight for their place.

Stimac, who was part of Croatia's squad that finished third in the 1998 World Cup in France, is conducting a training camp for the national team probables in preparation for the King's Cup in Thailand.

"We speak every day. I speak with all our players every day. That's my approach. I need to do that. I need to get information from them," Stimac said.

"Of course, Sunil (Chhetri) is very valuable to our team. He's a role model to these young players who are knocking on the door. He has played so many games, he's so experienced, and has scored so many goals. But as well as others, he needs to fight foro fight for a place in the team.

"We all start from zero. Football is like that. You don't get anything for the past. You get paid for today's job. As successful you are today, tomorrow you get your chance once again."

With less than two weeks to go for Stimac's first assignment, he said that he was concerned about the defence, and the lack of options, particularly at centre-back.

"Over the next few months, my job will be to find more competitors for the centre-back position, which we're short on right now," Stimac said.

The 37-man preliminary squad, which is undergoing a camp at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium, will be pruned to 23, by the time the team leaves for Thailand on June 1.

"In the next few days I have to decide on 25-26 players from this squad who will be the most valuable for this competition (King's Cup) and after that, the squad will be cut to 23."

Stimac was quizzed on the level of research he had done on India before accepting the job.

"I watched almost every in the Indian Super League. I've been informed about the young talents from the Indian Arrows.

"I recognised through my research about some players who didn't make it into Mr. (Stephen) Constantine's squad, for whatever reason. But, I'm here to give them the chance to prove themselves and show everyone how good they are," Stimac said.

Stimac said that he has so far focused on evaluating the fitness of the players.

"I'm happy with the condition of most of the players, and now I'll decide on the intensity of training over the next few days, which'll be important to see who can cope up with the demands.

"The next few days we'll be working on technical aspects and organisation on the pitch."

He was also impressed with the attitude of the players in the camp.

"I expect not only from Sunil (but) from Gurpreet (Singh Sandhu), from (Sandesh) Jhingan as well to be a role model to young players in a positive way. And not in a negative way because they're the ones who are looked up to," said Stimac.

(With PTI/AIFF inputs)