India battle-hardened to tackle Syria’s physicality – Chhetri

DOHA : India were not surprised by the physicality of the teams in their Asian Cup group but now have experience to test their strength against Syria, skipper Sunil Chhetri said on Monday.

India are bottom of Group B after losing to Australia and Uzbekistan, teams who outmuscled them as they struggled to win duels across the pitch and failed to score a goal.

“One thing we knew for sure was we would have to deal with their physicality. It wasn’t a surprise when we drew Australia, Uzbekistan and Syria,” Chhetri told reporters ahead of their final group game on Tuesday.

“What has helped us is we’ve had two games against teams that were quite physical. What’s more important is we rectify the small mistakes we made (in the first two games).

“We can’t change things completely, but knowing how we fared physically, we need to rectify mistakes. Playing those two teams has given us the experience we need to play physical games.”

India coach Igor Stimac said they know what to expect as both teams look for a result that could help them qualify for the knockout stage.

“All three teams are similar, very physical and playing in a similar way. We didn’t have many reasons to change our approach,” Stimac said.

“What’s interesting about Syria is they use the same 11 players, they have a small bench with two or three changes. They’re obviously limited on the bench. We’ll try and see how fresh they’re going to be tomorrow.”

Syria coach Hector Cuper said his team have played well “physically and technically” but scoffed at the idea that he needed to rotate his players more.

“There is an idea that the manager changes players for the sake of rotation, but we need more harmony among the players. This is what we ask them to achieve. We lacked that in the first match,” Cuper said.

“All 26 players should have one focus, one objective. Push and press and try to build up from the low block. We have talented players who will try and control the ball.

“I believe the Indian team have the same motivation to win three points. So we need to be more calm and focused on the match to get the three points and qualify for (the knockout stage for) the first time in our history.”