On Thursday, May 16, Sunil Chhetri, the captain of the Indian football team, announced his retirement from international football in a video posted on his official X account. The 39-year-old said that he will be playing his last match for India against Kuwait, which is the second round game of the FIFA World Cup qualifiers, at the Salt Lake Stadium in Kolkata on June 6.
During his emotional address, Sunil Chhetri talked about how he thought long and hard about his decision to retire from international football. He also remarked that “I have practically lived the dream” before stating that nothing comes to playing for the country.
In this article, SportsTiger looks at five major achievements of Sunil Chhetri in his international footballing career.
Most international appearances for India
After making his senior debut for India in 2005, scoring a goal against Pakistan, Sunil Chhetri started to take giant strides in his footballing career. The first international trophy for Sunil Chhetri came in 2007 when India won the Nehru Cup, and he went on to win the SAFF Championship and Intercontinental Cup multiple times on his way to playing 150 matches for the national team, the most in the Indian footballing history.
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Fourth highest international goal-scorer of all-time
Sunil Chhetri has scored 94 goals in his 150 matches for India, which puts him in fourth place in the highest international goal-scoring list of all-time. He is behind Cristiano Ronaldo of Portugal (128 goals in 206 matches) and Lionel Messi of Argentina (106 goals in 180 matches, the two of the modern-day footballing greats, while the Iranian Ali Daei has 108 goals in 148 matches.
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Third highest active goal-scorer in international football
Apart from being the fourth international highest goal-scorer of all-time, Sunil Chhetri is one of only three players in this list, who is playing active football currently. The Indian forward is going strong in international football at 39 years of age, just like his counterpart Cristiano Ronaldo, while Lionel Messi, who is a current holder of the FIFA World Cup, is 36 years old.
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Better goal-per-match ratio than Cristiano Ronaldo
Sunil Chhetri (0.63) currently boasts a better goal-per-match ratio in international football than Cristiano Ronaldo (0.62), who is the highest goal-scorer in history. On the same metric, he is also better than the likes of Lionel Messi, Neymar Jr, Romeru Lukaku, Miroslav Klose, Edin Dzeko, Samuel Eto’o, Alexis Sanchez, and Sadio Mane, among others.
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Three-time SAFF Championship Golden Boot winner
During his illustrious football career, Sunil Chhetri earned the SAFF Championship Golden Boot three times in 2011, 2021, and 2023, helping India to win the title on all three occasions. He won multiple awards including the Arjuna Award in 2011, Padma Shri in 2019, and Khel Ratna Award in 2021, apart from being the AIFF Player of the Year seven times from 2007 to 2019.
