Myanmar will be a difficult team to beat at home

Mumbai, Mar 18: Ahead of the AFC Asian Cup qualifiers final round match against Myanmar, Indian football coach Stephen Constantine termed their opposition as 'favourites at home' but expressed hope of getting a positive result in the away match on March 28.

'I think we have a good opportunity. We need to win our home games. Myanmar will be a very difficult game. They are favourites at home, they went to the Suzuki Cup final, India struggled against Myanmar in Myanmar. I would like to change that and we will go and give whatever we have, as we always do and hopefully we can get a result in Myanmar,' Constantine told reporters here.

Myanmar had emerged winners in the last meeting between the two sides -- in the 2014 edition of AFC Challenge Cup.

Constantine was speaking after the camp which was going on here to prepare for the March 22 international friendly against Cambodia in Phnom Penh followed by the March 28 AFC Asian Cup qualifier final round match against Myanmar in Yangon.

'So far, so good. We had a few players who have come in injured, we have tried to help. I have to thank I-League for giving me that extra week to prepare we needed.

Unfortunately, we had the AFC Cup, which took away 9-10 players from having them for



the full week. We lost a couple of days with those boys, but in OK condition,' he said about the preparations.

Asked if training in Mumbai helped the players, he said, 'Here in Andheri it is perfect. We have a fantastic field that we train on. More importantly, it's the same kind of weather we will get in Cambodia and Myanmar.'

He said two years ago when the team played in the World Cup Qualifiers they learned how to compete but this time they need to learn how to qualify.

'The first round of qualifiers we learned how to compete because we were not competing against anybody two years ago. We could not even beat Nepal.

'So in these games, we learned how to compete. This year we have to learn how to qualify. We have to play smart and to play smart we need support of everybody, time, camps, games.

'We have games confirmed till October, which is a first,' he said. 'We now have a bigger pool of players to select from.

'Now we have more competition for places, we have 2-3 people for each position and it's the guys who can do the work that we selected.

'There will be 1-2 changes. I don't want guys to think aaram se (relax), it's finished, comfortable; this will happen not happen with me,' he added.