India lost 0-2 to Thailand in a friendly at the Thammasat stadium as goals from Ben Davis and Poramet Arjvilai gave the under-strength hosts a comfortable win.
With both teams preparing for their respective Asian Cup qualifiers a week from now, both coaches experimented with their lineups. Thailand coach Masatada Ishii rested his main forwards, but that did little to dull their attacking impetus. Led by the incessant, direct running of Channarong Promsrikaew down the left Thailand were irresistible for most of the match.
They had 19 shots on goal (vs India's 7) and had they found a better accuracy than the 3 they got on target; the margin might have been much more. These numbers don't account for the multiple last ditch challenges centre-backs Anwar Ali and Sandesh Jhingan had to make on them inside the Indian box either.
The first goal came via good work on the right, and once it was worked to Davis in space at the edge of the box, he did the rest: a touch, a turn and a whack into the bottom corner. The goal came in the 8th minute, and they had to wait till the 59th for the second: which saw Poramet curl a sensational hit high into the top corner. The curl was so good, it started from outside the framework of the goal. India, though, were guilty then too off a cheap turnover and absolutely no pressure on the goalscorer as he took the shot.
At the other end, Liston Colaco crackled into life occasionally but failed to build any sustained threat. With the last kick of the first half, though, he squandered a golden opportunity when sent one-on-one against Thai goalkeeper Saranon Anuin but telegraphed his intentions with the opening up of his body and saw his shot saved. Late sub Lallianzuala Chhangte was guilty of another one-on-one miss, his shot curling wide of the far post after beating Anuin.
Had the two shots found their target, the reporting around this game from an Indian perspective might have been different but considering this was against a Thailand team that had rested most of their regular starters and had been kept from increasing their own tally with some extremely profligate finishing, that's not saying much.
Jhingan talked to the hosts' TV after the match: "The learning is that you need to take your chances," he said. "It was a friendly, we wanted to try some things. We created some chances, that's the positive. Now we'll go to the video room, analyse what went wrong."
"It was a good exercise ahead of the important match on the 10th," he said. When asked for what he would like to tell the fans to encourage them, he said, "The result will speak louder than words... I take full responsibility [for the poor result today]. I know the fans are upset, but we will keep doing our best to get a positive result [against Hong Kong in the Asian Cup qualifier]."
You can relive the match as it happened right here on our India vs Thailand live blog: