Indian players need more foreign exposure: Baichung Bhutia

Indian players need more foreign exposure to come up to the world standards, top footballer Baichung Bhutia said on Thursday.

"Indian football players need more international exposure, which they are lacking," Bhutia told reporters in Mohali, where the Mohun Bagan skipper along with his teammates had a brief stopover as they called on one of their injured players Sanjeev Marya at his residence.

Bhutia, however, said he was still happy the way national team was shaping up, with some good young talent showing a lot of promise ahead.

He said players like N Pradeep, Sunil Chetri, Stephen Dias and Subroto Pal were quite talented.

Bhutia said the team had good chances in the upcoming SAF and Asian Football Championships, but now they need to prepare well for it.

To a question, he lamented that after any major tournament they do not get adequate time to settle down to play for their clubs.

He also said that a few players of Bagan were down on account of injury, which had pushed them behind.

The entire team later proceeded to Ludhiana where they will be playing in the ONGC league on Saturday.

Asked about the Padmshri awarded to him, he said, "it is not just an honour for me, but I share it with my entire team and credit goes to all of them".