AFC Asian Cup: India's Sandesh Jhingan 'Disappointed With the Defeat' But Takes 'Good Lessons' from Australia Loss

India kept former champions Australia at bay till the 50th minute before eventually losing their AFC Asian Cup football tournament opening group match 0-2 in a gritty performance on Saturday.

Australia were the overwhelming favourites to win the Group B match and nobody gave India a chance but Igor Stimac’s men denied their mighty opponents any success in the first half and then five minutes into the second session, dishing out a superb defensive show.

The Indians, though, ran out of steam later on in the face of waves of attacks from the rampaging Australians, who won the title in 2015 and are ranked 25th in the world as against 102nd of Stimac’s team.

Jackson Irvine (50th minute) and Jordan Bros (73rd) scored for Australia to take home full three points from the match at the Ahmad bin Ali Stadium.

The Indian backline showed a remarkable performance giving the fans hope for the remaining group fixtures where India face Uzbekistan on January 18, and then wrapping up their group stage against Syria on January 23.

Indian center-back Sandesh Jhingan was disheartened having lost the match but felt that there was a lot to learn from the fixture.

“Of course, we are disappointed with the defeat. You’re playing a team who went to the Round of 16 in the World Cup, so we can expect what happened today. A lot of good points, a lot of good lessons to learn from it,” stated Jhingan when speaking to the Indian Super League.

Expressing optimism towards the upcoming matches and putting his faith in the team, he added, “We got two more games, it’s all about recovery now. Recover and get better, and then Uzbekistan and Syria and we aim to qualify for the next round. We stick to that, we keep our heads high, we stay confident and as I always say, the sky’s the limit for this batch.”

Jhingan had shown an exceptional performance and caught the spotlight for leading the backline with utmost maturity.

Addressing praises for his individual performance, the veteran believes he is just as good as the team and it’s always about the team.

He shared, “If the team wins, I had a great game, if the team loses, I had a bad game. That’s it. It’s all about the team. Of course, I want to contribute as much as I can which will help the team to win. But, I am as good as the team, so if the team loses, I am a loser today.”

Analyzing the match, the 30-year-old said, “In the first half we created decent chances, of course we dropped back at certain moments which was bound to happen, but we defended well at certain moments. Just these lessons, we gotta learn from them, we gotta play them more often.”

Jhingan was happy that they could force the Asian giants to break a sweat and was glad to witness a positive vibe in their dressing room. “We spoke now in the dressing room and there was a positive vibe. Of course, we were disappointed but in the back of our mind we knew, we could feel it, we could sense it, that they were having their nervy moments, we could hear it from their bench. They were panicking,” he said.