Less than a day after the country’s controversy-marred Round 2 exit from the 2026 Fifa World Cup qualifiers, the All India Football Federation has called for an investigation from Fifa and the Asian Football Confederation into the circumstances which led to India’s loss.
Playing Qatar in their final match of the qualifiers, India took a 1-0 lead in the contest before their opponents scored a controversial goal.
The replays showed the ball to have gone past the backline past Indian goalkeeper and captain Gurpreet Singh Sandhu, before a Qatari forward pulled it back in play and set it up for his team to score.
The referees let the goal stand, despite protests from the Indians.
“We have written to the FIFA Head of Qualifiers, AFC Head of Referees, AFC Head of Competitions, and the Match Commissioner, regarding the grave supervision error that practically costed us a place in FIFA World Cup Qualifiers Round 3,” the All India Football Federation Kalyan Chaubey said in a statement.
“We call upon the concerned authorities for a thorough investigation,” he added.
Chaubey also insisted on the need to “explore sporting compensation.”
“We have urged them to explore the possibilities of a sporting compensation to address the injustice and we trust that Fifa and the AFC will take necessary steps in this regard,” Chaubey’s statement read.
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