Stimac not happy with number of foreign players in ISL, I-League matches

National football team head coach Igor Stimac is not happy with more foreign players featuring in a match in Indian Super League and I-League, saying it was coming in the way of the country producing a future Sunil Chhetri.

Stimac said the ISL and I-League, the country's first and second tier leagues, should follow Asian Football Confederation's (AFC) policy of allowing a maximum of four foreign players in a match instead of the five permitted by them currently.

"My suggestion for top tier (league) in the country is to follow AFC rule of 3+1, that's the basic rule for number of foreign players. It's not strange that that most successful Asian countries are following that rule and that is why they are successful," Stimac said at a media briefing here.

"That is why they have option for national team to have strikers, offensive midfielders and the centre-backs," he added.

Currently, ISL and I-League teams can field five foreign players at a given time in a match. On the other hand, AFC Champions League competition rules state that "each participating club may register four foreign players but at least one must have the nationality of an AFC member association".

Stimac said in the current situation, it was difficult to get replacement for star striker Chhetri.

"We will never find a replacement for Chhetri if the situation is like this. We cannot take someone who has never played as a striker and put him in the national team. Where am I going to find a striker? Even in I-League, there are five foreign players.

"We don't have (Indian) strikers in I-League. Only Indian Arrows is putting (striker) Vikram (Pratap Singh) to play. We are in a big problem. We need to start changing the things in favour of national team."