Under a team picture with the lights shining in the background, Igor Stimac chose just one word to send the message across: “Believe,” the India coach said in bold on social media.
The picture was presumably taken after the last training session, before the Indian football team takes on the might of Australia in their opening round clash of the AFC Asian Cup at the Ahmad bin Ali Stadium in Qatar on Saturday. India find themselves in a tough group that also includes strong Uzbekistan and Syria. But having won three trophies last year and qualified for successive Asian Cups for the first time since this format started, they are not there merely to make up the numbers.
“Football is a beautiful game where anything can happen,” Stimac told TOI on the eve of the tournament opener. “We are aware of Australia’s quality and respect them, like all our opponents, but we are not taking the field to surrender.”
Australia (world rank 25) score most of their goals from set-pieces and crosses. Against India, the game plan will be no different. Asked how he intends to counter the threat from the former champions, Stimac had a simple answer. “Don’t give away set pieces,” he said with a laugh.

Staying compact is another option, said the Croatian coach, though there’s no denying this team is significantly weaker without the physicality of first-choice players like defender Anwar Ali and midfielder Jeakson Singh, besides Ashique Kuruniyan. Sahal Abdul Samad has also not recovered from his ankle injury and KP Rahul is only good enough to start on the bench for the opener.
“Not having them is hard. We would have been a different side,” admitted Stimac. Unlike most teams, India did not play friendlies in the lead-up to this tournament. There wasn’t enough time; the coach wanted a month for preparations, he got less than two weeks.
Stimac is likely to adopt a safetyfirst approach, similar to the one against Kuwait in the World Cup qualifier, with focus on counter attacks.

“Against Australia, we need boys who can run, fight, chase, pass and especially defend crosses which will come into our box. Their players come in numbers to attack the crosses, so what we badly need is height,” said Stimac.
Australia arrive in Qatar looking to rediscover the form that took them to the knockout stage of the last World Cup where they almost dragged eventual champions Argentina into extra time. Since that impressive run, Graham Arnold’s side has enjoyed encouraging results against heavyweights like England (0-1) and Mexico (2-2) in friendlies.
Understandably, nobody is giving India a chance against the mighty Socceroos, ranked 77 places above. But, regardless of the feeling outside, at least within the squad, there is no shortage of belief.