When the Indian Super League first came into the limelight, Sunil Chhetri was the most noticeable absentee. Bengaluru FC’s refusal to lend its players to the ISL for its inaugural season had robbed the new league of the country’s most prized football asset, which was seen as a blow to its credibility.
Chhetri, the poster boy of Indian football, too was deprived of a deserved chance to become the face of a revolution. Instead, the captain of the national team and the country’s greatest ever goalscorer was forced to watch from a distance as the ISL took India by storm and subsequently drove conversations across the world. Even fans who turned out in huge numbers felt shortchanged in missing out on the most popular football player in the country.
All that is now in the past. Nearly halfway through the second season of the ISL, Chhetri is already living up to the hype and delivering on his Rs. 1.2 crore price tag.
He missed Mumbai’s opening two games due to national team duty and returned to find the club in crisis mode. Andre Moritz, the team’s most influential player last season, had left the club in mysterious circumstances. Lalrindika Ralte, one of Mumbai’s most consistent performers in a dreadful first season, was ruled out of the tournament due to ankle injury. And player-manager Nicolas Anelka wasn’t fit enough to start matches.
Amid huge expectations, the side had picked up only one point from the first two matches. In both of those matches, a 1-3 defeat in Pune and a goalless draw in Kerala, Mumbai had lacked a cutting edge in the attacking third. With Anelka unfit, striker Frederic Piquionne misfiring and both Sony Norde and Singham Subhash Singh less than adept in front of goal, Mumbai were in desperate need of a focal point in attack and a finisher.
Enter Sunil Chhetri.
In his first game back against Chennaiyin FC, the 31-year-old forward looked understandably rusty. He had returned to India less than 72 hours prior to the match and was visibly tired. Playing as one of the wide men in a front three didn’t help either. As Mumbai prefer to attack through Norde on the opposite flank, Chhetri’s involvement in the game was very little. A 0-2 defeat meant Mumbai’s season got worse: Three matches, one point, only one goal scored.
Chhetri the playmaker
Since then, Chhetri has moved into a central role just behind the centre forward and transformed the club’s season. In him, Mumbai have found a finisher, a playmaker and a leader in one go. According to Oscar Bruzon, the club’s assistant coach, Chhetri has “exceeded all expectations”. He has scored six goals in the last three matches to stake his claim for the Golden Boot, while Mumbai have scored nine times in those matches to satiate the hunger of 20,000-odd supporters at the DY Patil Stadium with some delicious football.
The juggernaut started against Delhi Dynamos when Chhetri produced an unerring low shot that typified his class in front of goal. It was the sort of half-chance that his teammates had been fluffing in previous matches. His second, a tap-in late in the game, showed a knack of popping up in the right places at the right time.
Off the ball, he is frequently seen barking instructions to his teammates on the pitch and encouraging them to take up the right positions. He is both a high-energy stimulus and a calming influence at once. When winger Gabriel Fernandes found himself in a heated exchange with a couple of Delhi players on the stroke of half-time, Chhetri diffused the situation and walked him to the dressing room.
The Indian forward is an intelligent player who is composed on the ball and prefers to make things happen rather than wait for the game to come to him. When playing for India, Chhetri is often left isolated upfront. At Mumbai City, he seems to have found his sweet spot in the space between midfield and attack. He lends variety to Mumbai’s offensive game. A sumptuous through ball to Piquionne against FC Goa showed his eye for a pass and a cunningly deceptive free-kick routine against NorthEast United brought out his inventive side.
The ‘Panenka’
Sure, half of his six goals so far have been penalties but it also takes a cool head to convert them. Already this season, Senegalese forward Diomansy Kamara and Spanish midfielder Javier Lara have missed from the spot. Chhetri, however, has scored with perfectly taken penalties. In fact, he has showboated along the way too when he audaciously chipped TP Rehenesh from the spot – a “Panenka” penalty named after Czech Antonin Panenka who produced it for the first time in 1976. It not only made a complete mockery of the goalkeeper’s attempts at playing mind games but also sent the crowd into raptures.
Throughout his career, Chhetri has performed at a level that has instilled a sense of pride in every Indian. In an ISL season in which homegrown footballers appear to have taken a back seat, he is once again singularly proving to be the torchbearer of Indian football and the key influence in turning around the flagging fortunes of Mumbai City FC.
Chhetri, the poster boy of Indian football, too was deprived of a deserved chance to become the face of a revolution. Instead, the captain of the national team and the country’s greatest ever goalscorer was forced to watch from a distance as the ISL took India by storm and subsequently drove conversations across the world. Even fans who turned out in huge numbers felt shortchanged in missing out on the most popular football player in the country.
All that is now in the past. Nearly halfway through the second season of the ISL, Chhetri is already living up to the hype and delivering on his Rs. 1.2 crore price tag.
He missed Mumbai’s opening two games due to national team duty and returned to find the club in crisis mode. Andre Moritz, the team’s most influential player last season, had left the club in mysterious circumstances. Lalrindika Ralte, one of Mumbai’s most consistent performers in a dreadful first season, was ruled out of the tournament due to ankle injury. And player-manager Nicolas Anelka wasn’t fit enough to start matches.
Amid huge expectations, the side had picked up only one point from the first two matches. In both of those matches, a 1-3 defeat in Pune and a goalless draw in Kerala, Mumbai had lacked a cutting edge in the attacking third. With Anelka unfit, striker Frederic Piquionne misfiring and both Sony Norde and Singham Subhash Singh less than adept in front of goal, Mumbai were in desperate need of a focal point in attack and a finisher.
Enter Sunil Chhetri.
In his first game back against Chennaiyin FC, the 31-year-old forward looked understandably rusty. He had returned to India less than 72 hours prior to the match and was visibly tired. Playing as one of the wide men in a front three didn’t help either. As Mumbai prefer to attack through Norde on the opposite flank, Chhetri’s involvement in the game was very little. A 0-2 defeat meant Mumbai’s season got worse: Three matches, one point, only one goal scored.
Chhetri the playmaker
Since then, Chhetri has moved into a central role just behind the centre forward and transformed the club’s season. In him, Mumbai have found a finisher, a playmaker and a leader in one go. According to Oscar Bruzon, the club’s assistant coach, Chhetri has “exceeded all expectations”. He has scored six goals in the last three matches to stake his claim for the Golden Boot, while Mumbai have scored nine times in those matches to satiate the hunger of 20,000-odd supporters at the DY Patil Stadium with some delicious football.
The juggernaut started against Delhi Dynamos when Chhetri produced an unerring low shot that typified his class in front of goal. It was the sort of half-chance that his teammates had been fluffing in previous matches. His second, a tap-in late in the game, showed a knack of popping up in the right places at the right time.
Off the ball, he is frequently seen barking instructions to his teammates on the pitch and encouraging them to take up the right positions. He is both a high-energy stimulus and a calming influence at once. When winger Gabriel Fernandes found himself in a heated exchange with a couple of Delhi players on the stroke of half-time, Chhetri diffused the situation and walked him to the dressing room.
The Indian forward is an intelligent player who is composed on the ball and prefers to make things happen rather than wait for the game to come to him. When playing for India, Chhetri is often left isolated upfront. At Mumbai City, he seems to have found his sweet spot in the space between midfield and attack. He lends variety to Mumbai’s offensive game. A sumptuous through ball to Piquionne against FC Goa showed his eye for a pass and a cunningly deceptive free-kick routine against NorthEast United brought out his inventive side.
The ‘Panenka’
Sure, half of his six goals so far have been penalties but it also takes a cool head to convert them. Already this season, Senegalese forward Diomansy Kamara and Spanish midfielder Javier Lara have missed from the spot. Chhetri, however, has scored with perfectly taken penalties. In fact, he has showboated along the way too when he audaciously chipped TP Rehenesh from the spot – a “Panenka” penalty named after Czech Antonin Panenka who produced it for the first time in 1976. It not only made a complete mockery of the goalkeeper’s attempts at playing mind games but also sent the crowd into raptures.
Throughout his career, Chhetri has performed at a level that has instilled a sense of pride in every Indian. In an ISL season in which homegrown footballers appear to have taken a back seat, he is once again singularly proving to be the torchbearer of Indian football and the key influence in turning around the flagging fortunes of Mumbai City FC.
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