Nepali National football coach Kumar Thapa and newly appointed captain Anjila Tumbapo Subba see an opportunity for Nepal in SAFF Women’s Championship at Dasharath Stadium to fulfil what the team have never achieved in the past—the winners’ trophy. The sixth edition of the Championship begins on Tuesday.

Nepal will open their group stage campaign taking on Bhutan on Tuesday and Sri Lanka on Monday in the three-team Group ‘B.’

Nepal have finished runners up on four occasions among five editions of the biennial tournament. They failed to make it to the final only once—in the 2016 edition—after they lost to India 3-1 in the semi-finals. In the other four editions, they have come up short against India in the finals.

Coincidentally, it was under Thapa’s regime Nepal hit their lowest in the Championship. And the former Nepali international believes that he has got a second chance not just to make up for the weakness of the fourth edition but also to win the elusive trophy.

“We have had good preparations and it’s an opportunity for me as well as the team,” said Thapa at a pre-tournament conference in Kathmandu on Monday. “I have got a second chance and it is also the last chance for many players of the squad. We have the hunger for the championship. We need to make sure that we minimise our errors and put up our best show.”

It will be the second occasion Nepal will be hosting the regional event and first time in Kathmandu. Nepal hosted the last edition of the game in Biratnagar in 2019.

Goalkeeper Tumbapo, who will be shouldering the captain's responsibility for the first time, echoed her coach. She was named the captain after skipper Renuka Nagarkote picked up a shoulder injury about a month ago in a training camp for the Asian Games.

“It is the dream of every player to lead the team as captain one day and same is with me. I thank ANFA and the coach for putting faith in me,” said Tumbapo.

“Now the opportunity has come to win the trophy as a captain. We believe we can win the trophy at home and we have also made sound preparation for the tournament. I am not sure if I will be in the next edition. It is time for us to show on the ground what we are capable of.”

Along with Nagarkote, defender Puja Rana, who fractured leg during a training session, is also out of the team. Sarmila Thapa, a regular member of the squad since 2014, will also be absent from the squad as the Army midfielder is currently out of the country on a United Nations peacekeeping mission.

Despite being pitted in the comparatively easier group, coach Thapa said that it would be a mistake to underestimate Bhutan and Sri Lanka—the opponents Nepal have defeated in every encounter in the past—on the basis of previous results.

“Bhutan and Sri Lanka should not be judged on the basis of 2019 performance. They are strong and tough opponents,” the coach said.

Thapa has included three new faces in the squad including forward Amisha Karki, midfielder Dipa Shahi and defender Samiksha Ghimire. Forward Rekha Paudel has marked her comeback to the national squad after three years.

Nepal’s first game opponents Bhutan arrived for the tournament 10 days prior to kick off and also played a couple of friendly matches to fine tune their preparation. “We have a youth team and we have not played abroad for three years,” Bhutan’s captain Pema Choden Tshering said.

“It is really difficult to play against the home team. Nepal are a strong side and it is tough to play ahead of the home supporters. But we are hopeful of a good performance.”

Sri Lanka coach Chaminda Neel Steinwall said football was also hit hard by the recent economic and political crisis like any other sector of the country. “We had a four-week preparation camp for the tournament,” he said. “But it was a really tough task to organise the camp staying at the same place as many players are outside of Colombo. Now we are into the tournament and will try our best to perform well.”

Group ‘A’ consists of champions India, Bangladesh, the Maldives, and Pakistan, who are making their comeback to international football after five years as the FIFA lifted its suspension on the country’s football governing body in July this year.

Dasharath Stadium to host first women’s tournament

The Championship is the first official women’s football tournament being hosted at the Dasharath Stadium though the men’s team played their first official international tournament in the stadium at the 1984 South Asian Federation Games, currently named South Asian Games (SAG).

The Nepali women football team embarked on their international journey in 1986 through AFC Women's Championship in Hong Kong. But they had to wait for more than three decades to play their first international match at the main stadium of the country when they hosted Bangladesh for a two-match friendly in September last year.

That long wait for the first international women’s tournament at the Dasharath Stadium is set to end on Tuesday with the kickoff of the regional championship.