The Indian football team will look to register their first win in the World Cup and Asia Cup qualifiers against lower-ranked Bangladesh on Monday. The Sunil Chhetri-led national team is ranked 105 while Bangladesh is ranked 184.
The Indian team, who have not registered a single win in six matches, are fourth in Group E with three points. The team is already out of the race to qualify for the World Cup, but the hopes of getting tickets for the Asia Cup to be held in 2023 are yet to come.
It is also not yet decided whether the Indian team will directly enter the third round of the Asia Cup qualifiers. Because only the top four teams placed fourth out of eight groups will qualify for the next round. India has not been able to register a win in the World Cup qualifiers for 6 years. So far, six teams running in fourth place have more points than India.
In such a situation, if Igor Stimac’s team has to make a chance to qualify for the third round, then it will have to beat Bangladesh at any cost. Not only this, this will be India’s first win in the World Cup qualifiers in the last six years. Their last win was in November 2015 against Guam in Bangalore 1-0. In the last match against Asian champions Qatar, playing with ten players, India lost 0-1.
Indian midfielder Anirudh Thapa joined the team on Sunday after recovering from the coronavirus infection. Before the match against Bangladesh, the doctors of the organizing committee approved Thapa to join the team. The 23-year-old football player was found coronavirus positive on June 3 and has been in isolation at the team hotel since then. The AIFF general secretary Kushal Das had confirmed the news on Friday. Thapa did not play in the match against Qatar.
When and where to watch India vs Bangladesh match live
India vs Bangladesh Asian Cup qualifier match will be held at Jassim Bin Hamad football stadium and will kick off at 7:30 pm IST. The Star Sports network will telecast the match on TV. Channels that will broadcast the match live are Star Sports 2 SD & HD, Star Sports 3, Star Sports 1 SD & HD (Hindi). India and Bangladesh football battle will also be available on OTT platforms. Disney+ Hotstar VIP and JioTV will stream the match online.
