India vs Bhutan,

SAFF U-16 Women’s Championship 2024

Football Accent :

Preview :

The SAFF U-16 Women’s Championship 2024 will be the first SAFF youth football tournament for the U-16s . India previously won the SAFF U-15 Women’s Championship twice in 2018 and 2019. Recently , U-19 Blue Tigresses jointly winning the SAFF U-19 Women’s Championship in Bangladesh earlier this month. Now U-16 girls have the chance to bring the trophy home .

Indian U-16 Women’s Football Team gearing up for the SAFF U-16 Women’s Championship 2024 opening match where they will take on Bhutan on Friday , 1 March at 2:45 PM IST at the ANFA Complex in Lalitpur, Nepal.

Head coach Biby Thomas said, “Our preparations have been well. India are a football development country and we’re always focusing on the future. In these youth tournaments, we always want to give opportunities to players to develop.”

“Our girls are high on confidence despite this being their first international tournament. Their unity shows on the training pitch and they are hungry for success,” he added.

Shveta Rani , India’s captain for the tournament , is the only player with prior international experience. She was in the U-17 squad for the AFC U-17 Women’s Asian Cup Qualifiers in Kyrgyzstan last year.

The 15-year-old midfielder from Haryana said, “We held practice sessions for almost two months in Goa with our good coach. We have a great bunch of players. We’re all new to international football, but it doesn’t matter that we’ve not got any experience. The real experience comes from our heart and we have no shortage of that.”

“We could easily adapt here in Nepal. It’s cooler here as compared to Goa where we held our camp, but many parts of India also have such sort of weather in the winter, so we have no problem in adjusting to this environment.”

Thomas added, “Of course, we don’t know anything about our opponents so far, since this is probably the first time most of the players are playing a SAFF tournament. However, in youth tournaments like these, all teams are competitive because they are hungry to prove themselves. We will get the opportunity to watch Bangladesh and Nepal play on Saturday. For tomorrow, we have to fulfil all preparations from our end and go for the win.”

Fixtures :

India vs Bhutan

Friday, 1 March, 2024

Kick-off – 2:45 PM IST

Venue – ANFA Complex, Lalitpur, Nepal

Live Telecast Information:

The match will be telecast live on Sportzworkz YouTube Channel