Sunil Chhetri announced his decision to retire from international football after the FIFA World Cup qualifier against Kuwait in Kolkata on 6 June, bringing curtains on a glorious near two-decade career.
The long-serving Indian national team captain announced his decision in a video on his social media accounts.
“It’s not that I was feeling tired. When the instinct came that it should be my last game, that I thought about it a lot. And eventually I came to this decision. So will I be sad after this? Of course. Do I feel sad sometimes, every day because of this? Yes. Do I miss that after 20 days of training all of this will be gone? Yes. It’ll all be gone. Yes, it took time because this kid inside, he never wants to stop. If given a chance to play for his country, never,” he said in a video on social media.
“You know, the feeling that I recollect in the last 19 years is a very nice combination between duty, pressure and immense joy. I never thought individually these are the many games that I played for the country. This is what I’ve done, good or bad. But now I did it. This last one and a half, two months I did it.”
“I did it because probably I was going towards the decision that this game, this next game is going to be my last. And the moment I told myself first that this is the game that’s going to be my last, is when I started recollecting everything. It was so strange,” he added in the video.
I'd like to say something... pic.twitter.com/xwXbDi95WV
— Sunil Chhetri (@chetrisunil11) May 16, 2024
The 39-year-old revealed the decision first to his family and disclosed his wife and mother burst into tears.
“So when I did decide that this is going to be last, I told my mom, my dad and my wife, my family first. My dad was my dad, he was normal. He was relieved, happy, everything. But my mom and my wife strangely started crying and I told them, you always used to bug me that there are too many games, there is too much pressure when you watch me. And now that I’m telling you that I’m not going to play for my country anymore after this game. And even they couldn’t express to me why they burst into tears.”
Chhetri had made his 150th appearance for India in March and scored on the occasion against Afghanistan in Guwahati. However, it ended in a 1-2 defeat .
India are currently second in Group A in 2026 FIFA World Cup Qualifiers with four points, behind leaders Qatar.
Chhetri, who debuted for India in 2005, has scored 94 goals for the country. He will bow out as India’s all-time top scorer and most-capped player. He is third in the list of international goal scorers among active players behind Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi.
