After a poor attendance of 2,569 in the first match of the Intercontinental tournament, Indian captain Sunil Chettri uploaded a video on his social media requesting Indians to attend Indian football matches. A lot of other famous personalities like Virat Kohli, Sachin Tendulkar, Sania Mirza, Ajinkya Rahane also supported the Indian Football team captain and shared his video. the game was sold out before the match day. The match against Kenya was also Chhetri’s 100th match for India in which the forward scored a brace, and lead India to win 3–0. All tickets for India’s Intercontinental Cup game against Kenya were sold out after Sunil Chhetri’s urged fans to come and watch the Indian national team play.
The tweet by the Indian Football team captain was the most retweeted tweet in 2018, as per Twitter India and was it was awarded The Golden Tweet. The tweet was as follows:
This is nothing but a small plea from me to you. Take out a little time and give me a listen. pic.twitter.com/fcOA3qPH8i
— Sunil Chhetri (@chetrisunil11) June 2, 2018
“All the fans, who came out in Mumbai to support us…thank you. It means the world to us.But, I’m making this video not for you guys, I’m going to speak, appeal and request all of you, who did not come. To everyone, who is not a football fan…please come and watch us. Two reasons…number one: it is the best game in the world and number two, we play for our country. We will make sure that once you come watch us, you will not go the same person back home.
“To all of you, who have lost hope or don’t have any hope in Indian football, we request you to come and watch us in the stadium.
“It’s not fun to criticise and abuse on internet. Come to the stadium, scream at us, shout at us.”
“Sometimes you guys think the level is not the same so why waste your time?” said Chhetri. “I agree the level is not the same, not even close, but with our desire and determination, we will try our best to make your time worth it.”
2018 Intercontinental Cup
The 2018 Intercontinental Cup was a 4-team association football tournament organized by the AIFF as part of the senior men’s team’s preparation for 2019 AFC Asian Cup. The tournament was held at the Mumbai Football Arena in the Indian city of Mumbai between 1 and 10 June 2018.
The four teams that participated in the tournament were:
- India
- Kenya
- New Zealand
- Chinese Taipei
The result of the Intercontinental Cup 2018 was as follows:
- Champions : India
- Runners-up : Kenya
- Third place : New Zealand
- Fourth place : Chinese Taipei
