Two from city in Indian team

Bengaluru boys Sanjeev Stalin and Hendry Antonay have been included in the Indian team for the FIFA U-17 World Cup that gets underway from October 6.

Playing in their first-ever FIFA event, the Indian side has been placed alongside USA, Ghana and Colombia in Group ‘A’ and they begin their group stage engagements against the United States on the opening day at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium in New Delhi.

While Sanjeev was brought into the game by his father Stalin Senior, Hendry got his first taste of the game in the lanes of Austin Town before scouts from Ozone FC, a city based club, took him under their wings nearly five years ago.

A left-back by trade, Hendry has been a part of Ozone’s U-13, U-15 teams and impressed at a number of important tournaments before being included into the Indian U-16 side by the then coach Nicolia Adam.

Sanjeev too is a full-back and is also one of the set-piece specialists in the side.

Apart from the two, head coach Luis Norton de Matos has also named two NRIs, Namit Deshpande and Sunny Dhaliwal in the team.

Deshpande, a US national, has a valid Indian passport while Dhaliwal has surrendered his Canadian passport and acquired an Indian one.

Squad: Goalkeepers: Dheeraj Singh, Prabhsukhan Gill, Sunny Dhaliwal; Defenders: Boris Singh, Jitendra Singh, Anwar Ali, Sanjeev Stalin, Hendry Antonay, Namit Deshpande; Midfielders: Suresh Singh, Ninthoinganba Meetei, Amarjit Singh Kiyam, Abhijit Sarkar, Komal Thatal, Lalengmawia, Jeakson Singh, Nongdamba Naorem, Rahul Kannoly Praveen, Md. Shahjahan; Forwards: Rahim Ali, Aniket Jadhav.