Indian Football Team / Announcement of the new captain of the Indian football team, this player got the command in place of Sunil Chhetri

Indian Football Team: Indian football star Sunil Chhetri has recently retired from international football. He was also the captain of the Indian football team. In such a situation, after the retirement of Sunil Chhetri, the Indian football team has to announce a new captain. The new captain of the team will take charge of the team from the 2026 FIFA World Cup qualifying match against Qatar. This match is to be played on June 11.

Announcement of the new captain of the Indian team

India's first-choice goalkeeper Gurpreet Singh Sandhu has been appointed captain of the team for the 2026 FIFA World Cup qualifying match against Qatar. India will play hosts Qatar at the Jassim Bin Hamad Stadium on Tuesday. The Indian team reached Doha on Saturday night for the match. The team can enter the third stage of the World Cup qualifiers for the first time by winning this match. This will be India's first match after Sunil Chhetri's retirement. Chhetri recently retired from international football after a goalless draw against Kuwait.

Important match for Indian football team

Head coach Igor Stimac announced a 23-member squad for this match which does not include defense line players Amey Ranawade, Lalchungnunga and Subhashish Bose. Bose had requested not to be included in the team due to personal reasons. Regarding Ranawade and Lalchungnunga, Stimac said that I am satisfied with both those players. We worked on various aspects of their game for the future. We had a good conversation before excluding them from the team that came here and they know where they need to improve their game. I hope both of them will use the coming time to improve and come back stronger.

This was said on making Gurpreet Singh the captain

Stimac said that handing over the captaincy to Gurpreet was not a difficult task. The 32-year-old player is the most experienced player in the team with 71 international matches. Stimac said that Gurpreet has played the responsibility of captaincy in some matches with Sunil and Sandesh (Jhingan) for the last five years. So naturally it was a contender for this. Qatar has already qualified for the third stage by topping the group. 21 players in its 29-member team are under 24 years of age. If the Indian team loses the match, it will be out of the qualifiers for the third stage of the World Cup. India is in second place after Qatar with five points. Afghanistan is in third place with five points and Kuwait is in fourth place with three points.