BRICS Cup: Indian colts take on their Russian counterparts in the historic first edition

by Chittu Shetty October 4, 2016

India U-17 take on Russia U-17 in the historic first edition of BRICS Cup

Over the last couple of years, a football tournament among the BRICS nations were doing the rounds and finally India this year on the occasion of the 8th BRICS summit will host the historic first edition of BRICS Cup.

Originally Brazil, Russia, India and China were grouped as “BRIC” (or “the BRICs”) before the induction of South Africa in 2010. The BRICS members are all leading developing or newly industrialized countries that annually meet to increase their contribution in global market. After some initial talks, last year around this same time, it was declared that India will host the BRICS Cup on the occasion of 8th BRICS summit.

The Tournament will take place once every year as a 10-day event and following the lines of the FIFA under-17 tournaments. Each edition will be held in a BRICS nation. On 1st October 2016, Indian Prime Minister India Narendra Modi, unveiled the Trophy for the 2016 BRICS U-16 Football Tournament in New Delhi. After participating in the AFC U-16 Championship in Goa, the Indian U-17 World Cup Squad will gear up to face Russia in their opening encounter.  It will be an important experience for India’s world cup bound squad to face possible challengers next year. Nicolai Adam, Head Coach of the Indian U-17 World Cup Squad, had earlier opined, “The BRICS Cup gives us an opportunity to play a minimum of four International matches. It (BRICS Cup) will add to the experience of the boys as we prepare for the FIFA U-17 World Cup”

Ahead of India’s first game against Russia, Nicolai stressed on the importance of the tournament and what it means for the players, “We are thankful for the BRICS Tournament and it helps us to gather more experience under our belts whilst exposing us to strong Teams. The BRICS U-17 Football Tournament is like a pre-World Cup as there are five Teams from four different confederations”

“We have to be competitive in the BRICS Tournament and ensure that we are hard to beat”, the Indian Coach said in the official Pre-Tournament Press Conference.

While talking about their opponent Russia Nicolai added, “Russia is a fantastic Team and we respect them as opponents. They finished their qualifying campaign with nine points and we look forward to giving them a hard fight, come tomorrow”

Russian U-17 coach Dimtry Ulyanov seemed well aware of what challenges India could provide but ys confident of his team’s ability “We are expecting a tough challenge from India. However, we are ready for the Tournament as we come on the back of a Tournament in France and had participated in the UEFA Development Tournament as well”

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Need to hunt actively for the ball-Adams

When asked about his analysis on India’s encouraging performance in AFC U-16 competition, Nicolai explained that his team needs to work on some technicalities, “We need to hunt actively for the ball and once we have the ball, we need to keep it better. Our philosophy is to score as many goals as possible but in order to score we need to have possession. Sometimes lack patience and commit a lot. It is normal not to have balance in youth Football, but we have to strive to right our wrongs”, he stated.

Indian colts captain Suresh Singh who was also present in the Press Conference praised the German Coach’s work ethic and said, “We have developed into better Player under Nicolai-sir and he has taught us a lot when it comes to Football”

India take on Russia in the day’s Second encounter tomorrow at 8PM after China take on Brazil in the opening one at 5PM, the match will be live telecasted on DD Sports.

India’s fixtures in the U-16 BRICS Cup:

October 05: India vs. Russia

 October 07: India vs. South Africa

October 11: India vs. China

 October 13: India vs. Brazil