AIFF promises competitive team in U-17 WC, announces UAE tour for the chosen boys

HOSTING THE U-17 World Cup 2017 is being seen as a pivotal moment for the country's relationship with the beautiful game by the Indian football fraternity. And to make sure it's a success, AIFF is working hard to ensure that the team India fields in this tournament is able and competitive, Kushal Das told PTI.

The AIFF General Secretary said that boys hand-picked to be part of this historic team, who will be the first Indian team to take part in a World Cup of any age group in football, have been hard at training for the better part of the year,

"The way we are preparing, those boys will be the backbone of future Indian teams... we are preparing a competitive Indian team for the U-17 World Cup. We went to Germany, Spain and qualified for the AFC U-16 Championships on merit. We are next going to UAE. The core team is more or less the same though Nicolai Adam is still scouting for a few more players."

During their tour of Spain and Germany the Indian colts trained under different conditions and faced multipe club and academy sides, and earned a few wins. Later, they defeated Bahrain and Lebanon by margins of 5-0 and 6-0 respectively in the AFC U-16 Championship Qualifiers (they took part in them despite having gained direct qualification for being the hosts). 

The AFC U-16 Championship will be held in India between 15th September and 2nd October. It will be the precursor event before the country prepares to welcome the best footballing nations in the world and takes part in the prestigious torunament that has been the birthplace of multitudes of footballing greats. If this Indian team performs well in this stage, it may inspire future generations to connect with this sport at a much deeper level. That is what the Indian football fraternity is counting on for the greatest hope for the futre of football in India.