DeLaGarza has Robin on his radar

BENGALURU: As tiny Guam, with a population of just over 150,000, gets ready to battle India in the FIFA World Cup Asia qualifier on Thursday to brighten their chances of advancing to the next round, the star attraction for them on the field would be LA Galaxy defender AJ DeLaGarza.
The 27-year-old, who arrived on Monday from Los Angeles after a 24-hour long journey, was twice voted as Galaxy's best defender in the Major Soccer League in the United States.Having played alongside some of the biggest names in world football including David Beckham, DeLaGarza said he was geared up to joust with India striker Robin Singh in what he feels will be a challenging game.
When queried about the Bengaluru FC striker, DeLaGarza said: "Oh the big guy? He is a physical guy. We got into a couple of battles in Guam and I'm sure it's going to be the same on Thursday. I face fit guys like him day in and day out. For me it is about reading the play. I'll try not to get close to him as he is a big guy and he will knock me off the ball. But I might win headers over him. In Guam, every time they (India) played the ball on to his feet, I was there to get it off. I'll try and get a bit physical with him as he doesn't like contact," DeLaGarza said in brief chat here.
On how tough it was for him to play for Guam when he had an opportunity to don US colours, the unassuming centre-back said it took him nearly a year to finalize. "It was a tough decision to opt to play for Guam (and not USA). The decision was made as I was not getting enough opportunities to play in the first team and the wait was going on and on," said DeLaGarza, who has played in two friendlies for US.
The Galaxy player also gave credit to Guam coach Gary White for the turnaround in his career. "I didn't know that Guam had a national team and credit goes to the coach to get in touch with all of us playing outside the country," he said.
DeLaGarza also admitted that it won't be easy to take all three points against India at home. "It's going to be tough as the Indian team is pepped up. It's a very energetic and difficult Indian team so it's going to be tricky. We have to be compact and organized and we need to finish. Yes, we haven't scored in the last three matches but it's not a worry. I think hopefully the goals come and you will see something better," he asserted.
In his seventh year with the Los Galacticos, DelaGarza said it was an honour to play alongside the likes of former Liverpool veteran Steven Gerrard. "Gerrard is a legend and he'll go down as a legend. It's an honour to play with him. I've played with some pretty big guys in my career — Beckham, (Landon) Donovan, (Giovani) Dos Santos, (Robbie) Keane and Stevie. Stevie is the same as we saw at Liverpool. He is a great box-to-box player," he said.
We are humans and not machines: Mondal
India defender Arnab Mondal, who plays for ISL champions Atletico de Kolkata, rued the lack of preparation time ahead of India's big matches.
"We had a 10-day camp before the Iran match and that helped us a lot. If we didn't have that camp, we would have lost by a bigger margin. We didn't even have a friendly (before that match), the only game being the one against Nepal. That was never going to be enough. But I hope in future, if we play more, we can be a better side," Mondal said on Monday.
"It is really disappointing (to lose all five games). When you look at our away games against Oman and Turkmenistan, we didn't get much time to practice as a team and I think that was one of the reasons for our poor show," he added.
Mondal preferred to steer clear of the ISL vs India debate, saying: "I don't want to get into this controversy as I think the calendar itself is so tight… we don't have much breathing space. They were helpless and so were the national side. It is difficult as the guys who play ISL get very less time to recover. We play 2-3 games per week. Yes, this has an effect, after all we are humans and not machines. But when you turn up for the national side, I don't think we need anything else to be motivated for a game. Playing for the national side itself is the biggest motivation for any player."