Guwahati, 26 March

Indian football hit a new low with a gut-wrenching 1-2 defeat to lower-ranked Afghanistan in the FIFA World Cup Qualifiers here on Tuesday, the result reflecting the mess the sport currently finds itself in the country.

Entering the home leg match of the qualifiers as the fancied team, the 117-ranked India took the lead in the 37th minute, when talisman Sunil Chhetri struck his 94th international goal in his landmark 150th match. However, the Afghans hit back in the second half with goals from Rahmat Akbari (71') and Sharif Mukhammad (88'), leaving the packed house at the Indira Gandhi Athletic Stadium heartbroken after yet another failure.

Indian football has fared worse in the past. Who can forget the embarrassing defeat, by a similar margin, to tiny pacific nation Guam in 2015, when they faced off in a 2018 World Cup Qualifier. That reverse came against a country with a population of merely two lakh people, forcing the game's stakeholders in India to review the loss.

Those running the game refuse to learn from the mistakes made in the past and if Tuesday's match against the 158-ranked team is any indication, they have not taken the corrective measures required to lift the sport from the abyss it slipped into following prolonged period of inconsistency and indifferent results when it mattered the most. Often, it appears as if only Chhetri is turning up for a game and his teammates relying completely on his goal-scoring prowess to see the team through.

There is no new striker on the horizon with an ability and the game to succeed Chhetri, who will turn 40 on 3 August. Who after Chhetri? It is a question that has been haunting Indian football for a while. According to head coach Igor Stimac, the lack of longer preparatory camps is one of the factors responsible for the national team's failure to deliver in big tournaments, and the Croatian World Cup semifinalist has often been at loggerheads with the All India Football Federation (AIFF) owing to his inclination to express strong views on a public platform.

On the eve of the match, Stimac had said he would resign from the post if he failed to take India to the third round of the Word Cup Qualifiers, something the country has never achieved. If the problems on the field are not enough, the sport is also marred by issues off it with AIFF president Kalyan Chaubey being accused of siphoning off money from the federation's exchequer and using parent body's funds for personal expenses by its former principal legal advisor Nilanjan Bhattacharjee, who had been terminated from his services. The results notwithstanding, the AIFF bosses are not ready to admit that all's not well in Indian football.

In his landmark game, Chhetri did what was expected of him and found the back of the net from the spot after Haroon Amiri handled the ball inside the box in India's home leg match in the second round of the joint qualifiers for the World Cup and 2027 AFC Asian Cup.

Attacking on the counter with three strikers upfront, Afghanistan equalized as Akbari restored parity in the 71st minute after he shot from outside the box and the ball went through the legs of Rahul Bheke after a deflection to make it 1-1.

Disaster struck the Indians when a charging Gurpreet Singh was shown a yellow card and Sharif converted the resultant penalty (88') to give his team a 2-1 lead with just two minutes left in regulation time.

Earlier, Afghanistan goalkeeper Ovays Azizi guessed it right but the 39-year-old Chhetri packed enough power in his shot to beat the visiting custodian, much to the delight of the crowd that thronged the Indira Gandhi Athletic Stadium in anticipation of a fine performance form their much-loved footballer.

After a brief phase of relentless end-to-end attacks, Chhetri's strike separated the two teams at the half time and India held on to the lead until Rahmat Akbari equalised and Mukhammad put the visitors in lead, a strike which would eventually go on to dash Indian hopes as Afghanistan earned three points from the match.

Long before that, Liston Colaco came close to doubling India's lead. But he failed to control the ball as the Afghans managed to retrieve it from him. Right at the start of the match, Manvir Singh missed an easy chance to put India ahead but his shot off a rebound, after a Chhetri shot rattled the woodwork, flew over the net.

Stimac made three substitutions and brought Anirudh Thapa, Naorem Mahesh and Lallianzuala Chhangte in place of Brandon Fernandes, Liston Colaco and Chhetri. But, these changes did little to extend India's dominance and instead, the visitors found the equalizer. The worse was in store for India as the visitors put another one past a hapless Sandhu to break Indian hearts. India and Afghanistan drew the first leg 0-0 in Abha, Saudi Arabia on 22 March.