For Indian footballers, Euro 2020 would be a good pastime during the current break. But for Suresh Singh Wangjam, the Indian football team’...
For Indian footballers, Euro 2020 would be a good pastime during the current break. But for Suresh Singh Wangjam, the Indian football team’s 20-year-old midfielder, there’s not a lot of room to switch off.
Every time, the French football team was in action during the tournament, his phone buzzed. ‘Watch how (N’Golo) Kante plays’. A message from Sunil Chhetri popped up. The Indian captain who has been on Euro 2020 broadcast duty with Sony Sports Network for the Euros found enough time to sneak this message to the young midfielder.
It wasn’t just the Indian captain though. Goalkeeper Gurpreet Singh Sandhu too urged young Suresh to do the same. ‘Watch Kante play.’
In his short career so far, he has displayed traits mastered by the France and Chelsea midfielder – cover a lot of ground to close the space for opponents, break up play and bomb forward to join in the attack.
So it comes as a little surprise that Suresh Singh has played in each of the last five matches of the Indian national team. And his teammates’ eagerness for him to learn and improve suggests that they see him playing in that Indian shirt for a long, long time.
“Every now and then you...
