Striker Sunil Chhetri, who is recovering from an ankle injury, made it to the 20-member Indian squad for the Nehru Cup international football tournament, starting at the Ambedkar stadium in Delhi on Wednesday.
Dempo midfielder Clifford Miranda, Mohun Bagan's Rakesh Masih and N Mohanraj, East Bengal's Govin Singh and Subhash Singh, Churchill Brothers' goalkeeper Arindam Bhattacharya, Baldeep Singh (Jr) and Jagpreet Singh were the eight players left out of the 28 who had a short training camp at Gurgaon.
Coach Bob Houghton said at the pre-tournament press conference on Tuesday that he was hopeful of Chhetri being available for the latter part of the five-nation tournament.
He said the youngsters left out of the squad will get their chances in future.
India play their first match against Lebanon in the tournament opener on Wednesday.
India squad:
Goalkeepers: Subrata Pal, Subhashish Roy Chowdhury.
Defenders: N S Manju, Anwar, Deepak Mondal, Mahesh Gawli, Surkumar Singh, Gouramangi Singh, Samir Naik, Mehrajuddin Wadoo.
Midfielders: N P Pradeep, P Renedy Singh, Syed Rahim Nabi, Steven Dias, Anthony Pereira, Climax Lawrence.
Forwards: Sunil Chhetri, Baichung Bhutia (captain), Sushil Kumar Singh, Abhishek Yadav.
