Learnt a lot from the match against USA: midfielder Wangjam

Team India U-17 midfielder Suresh Singh Wangjam was infectiously positive, a day after the most memorable moment in his life. One match—a high-pressure, competitive one against the United States on the opening day of the FIFA U-17 World Cup in New Delhi—had thrown up enough lessons for him and his teammates.

After a 3-0 loss, the midfield anchor from Manipur relived the experience of playing in front of a 45,000-strong home crowd, lustily cheering on the boys in blue. The joy and excitement was writ large on his face. “For a 17-year-old, playing in front of such a huge audience was a fantastic experience. This is our first World Cup match and playing it was a historic moment for me. Even [Team India skipper] Sunil Chhetri told us that he would have given 15 years of his career to play in a World Cup. As a team, we were not nervous. We were very excited to play the game last night.”

Coach Luis Norton del Matos had expressed his unhappiness over the penalty conceded in the 30^th minute by India, who had successfully staved off the opponents' attempts to seize intiative in the early stages of the match. Admitting that it was an error that spoiled the team's plans, Suresh said, “Our mindset was to level 0-0 in half time, but in the final leg of the first half, we conceded one penalty. So all we discussed [during half time] was the need to focus, go out and give more of what we were doing in first half.

Team India was expectedly outclassed by USA who beat them 3-0. The scoreline notwithstanding, the young players took a lot of positives out of the game. Most importantly, the team, Suresh emphasised, was not scarred from the Friday night's loss. "It is a part of the game. We have to forget the 3-0 scoreline and focus on our next game.”

Analysing the game, Suresh said, “Our final passing was not good; we could make that better. When it comes to scoring, we had three to four chances; we missed it, so if we focus on that in Colombia match, that would be much better.”

Monday's match against Colombia is a virtual decider for host India, regarding its future in the tournament. 16 teams will make it to the next round. Colombia lost its first match against Ghana. The youngster predicted a tough match on the cards, even more physical than the one against the Americans.

"They will be more physical. There wasn't too much pressure from the USA. But we have played a friendly against Colombia, so we know their players. They will put more pressure on us. They too have to win the game becuase they have lost one already. It will be a tough match for us but we are well prepared for them,” he said.

Team India had gone into the World Cup as one of the least experienced sides. The biggest lesson they learnt in 90 minutes on the pitch on Friday night was that the margin of errors, at this level of the game, was minimal. “The USA scored on counters. We have to focus on that. We can't make any mistake. We have learnt this.”

Denying that the hosts were put under pressure by the USA in the first half—they were pinned to their own half for most part of the time—Wangjam said that the midfielders including him would look to give more passes to their pacy strikers Aniket Jadhav and Boris Singh. The latter's return from match suspension will definitely add teeth to the Indian attack. I think we have to give better passes to the striker. We have a good, fast striker in Aniket. Boris Singh is fast and has stamina too. The plan would be to give them the ball and create an offensive movement.”