“The Bengalis love their football,” former India coach Stephen Constantine tells me. 

“I can remember back to 2004, I think India played South Africa in a one-day cricket game on a Sunday afternoon, they had 45 or 50,000. We played Japan on a Wednesday evening, we had 90,000 and 25,000 people were outside. The interest for football has always been there, especially from the Bengalis. The two biggest clubs in India are from West Bengal. The passion for football is there.”

Tomorrow afternoon in Kolkata, an old rivalry will take on a new sporting dimension when India play their first match at the Salt Lake Stadium in eight years when they face neighbours Bangladesh in a Fifa World Cup qualification match.

With the Bangladeshi border only 50 miles away, tickets, priced between 100-499 Indian rupees (£1-5), have been snapped up for the two sides’ first meeting in a World Cup match since 1985, when only 8,000 people watched India win 2-1 at the “Mecca of Indian Football,” a venue which once housed 131,781 spectators for a Kolkata derby between East Bengal and Mohun Bagun. 

Now, the iconic stadium, officially known as Vivekananda Yuba Bharati Krirangan, is expected to be close to its 66,687 capacity.

Englishman Constantine, who coached India over seven years during two separate spells a decade apart, still refers to the national team as “we” nearly nine months after leaving the job. 

Back in England and looking for a new coaching role, he said “it was a huge honour to be India’s national team manager, not once but twice.” Having guided India into the top 100 of the Fifa world rankings, Constantine resigned in January when a late Bahraini penalty condemned them to a group-stage exit from the Asian Cup only a week after he had masterminded their first victory in the tournament in 55 years. 

He felt he had taken India as far as he could. “It was a tough decision. We had a really good run. We created a lot of history in that time. For me, I felt it was the right time.”

The formation of the franchise-based Indian Super League in 2013 in partnership with IMG and Star Sports prompted hopes that World Cup qualification was imminent but Constantine is more cautious. 

“Until our domestic league is more competitive than it currently is, until we are producing quality players to play in those leagues, it’s difficult. The fact that we qualified for the Asian Cup is fantastic, now the onus is on this current Indian team to do it again. 

“We need to be qualifying for the Asian Cup consistently, not once every 10 or 15 years. The World Cup is a bit too far for us this time. We do have a fantastic group of young players that we managed to bring through. We were the second-youngest team in the Asian Cup, 14 of the 23-man squad were under 23. There is huge potential there.”

Why the potential of a country of 1.32 billion has never been realised on a football pitch divides opinion. Constantine believes poor coaching has held the country’s footballers back. “There has been a huge problem with the coach education in India. Therefore we are not producing the players that we should be. 

“The quality is there, anywhere you go in India, you’ll find good players but if they’re not being taught the basics from the early ages you are not going to get the quality of players you want to play in the national team.”

Former Derby County midfielder Igor Stimac was hired to take India into World Cup qualification. A disappointing home defeat to Oman was followed by a creditable goalless draw away to Asian Cup holders Qatar. 

Now, The Blue Tigers are expected to go on the offensive in a match they must win to have any hope of returning to Qatar for the World Cup finals.

Indian midfielder Nikhil Poojary hailed the result in Doha as one of the best in the country’s history. “It was a great night for Indian football. Everyone played their due part and contributed to earn the desired result. We have to keep our heads down and keep working to get our first win now. Unless we get to win against Bangladesh, the draw against Qatar will lose its value.”

“The Bangladesh game is going to be very different from the last one against Qatar” admitted Stimac. “We need all our players to be fully fit and ready to play as per our plan. We respect Bangladesh as a team. We need to attack for 90 minutes to break down the two defensive blocks of Bangladesh.”

A former Arsenal trainee who attended the FA School of Excellence at Lilleshall alongside Michael Owen, Jamie Day has been in charge of Bangladesh since May 2018 and steered them through a two-leg tie against Laos in June in the first round of World Cup qualification. 

A late goal from 19-year-old midfielder Robiul Hassan in the away match was to prove decisive as “the Bengal Tigers played out a goalless draw in the second leg. It was fantastic to beat Laos and qualify. It was a great team effort from everyone involved. We believed we could beat them over two legs because of the work we had done [over] the previous 12 months.”

Goals are hard to come by for a team currently ranked 187th out of 210 nations in the latest world rankings. His squad, drawn entirely from the Bangladesh Premier League, have a combined total of 30 international goals between them, less than half that of Indian captain Sunil Chhetri. 

“I think scoring is always going to be an issue with most of the local clubs having foreign players as their strikers meaning our national forwards sometimes have to play out of position.”

Chhetri’s goal in India’s defeat to Oman was his 72nd goal in 112 appearances for his country, moving him into the top-10 men’s international goalscorers of all time, four ahead of Lionel Messi. 

The 35-year-old continues to be India’s talisman. “It’s not a one-man band,” said Constantine “He’s a born goalscorer, yes, but he doesn’t score those goals if someone doesn’t give him the ball. They have to start thinking about life after Chhreti because he isn’t going to be there much longer.” 

Bangladesh sit bottom of Group E following defeats to Afghanistan and Qatar. Day, however, believes those matches demonstrated continued signs of progress from his team. “We played very well against Afghanistan, who are 35 places above us in the rankings, and in my view deserved to get something from the game. We have learned that we can compete with higher-ranked opposition but if you give those teams opportunities, they will take them.”

A legend at Welling United, where he took his first coaching position a decade ago as player-manager leading them to the Conference South championship in 2013, Day had not managed a side since leaving his home-town club after a second spell in charge in January 2017. 

He now divides his time between England and South Asia, living away from his wife and four children for up to six or eight weeks at a time. Living in the second most densely populated city in the world hasn’t fazed the 40-year-old Londoner.

“Dhaka is a very busy place but everyone has been very welcoming since I have been in Bangladesh.”

In Dhaka, he has surrounded himself with an English coaching team including Stuart Watkiss and Bobby Mimms. “I think it’s important to have staff that you trust and know how you work. I think you have a style you always try to play at any team you coach, but you also have to adapt to the level of players you are working with and if possible change things slightly to achieve your ideas.” 

By changing his squad’s diet and introducing regular gym sessions, Day believes he has improved his players’ physiques. “I think in my time here we have become a lot fitter, stronger and more organised and learned how to win games which was not happening before we arrived.” 

After conceding two late goals to Oman, improving his squad’s stamina has also been one of Stimac’s priorities. “Against Qatar, we proved something to everyone who was talking about a lack of fitness among the players. My boys made sprints till the very last minute. They defended with such concentration throughout, which really proves their fitness capacity.”

Stimac, who won a World Cup bronze medal with Croatia in 1998, issued a rallying cry to the inhabitants of India’s “City of Joy.” 

“We have heard a lot about the passion for football in Kolkata. I want to see a full house at the YBK Stadium for our match against Bangladesh. You need to be our 12th player.”

For Day, ambitions are more circumspect. “We are looking forward to playing in Kolkata and hopefully a packed stadium and it will be a fantastic experience for everyone involved. India will be strong favourites to win the game at home and are ranked far higher (104th) but we hope to give them a good match and cause them a few problems.

“I think this current World Cup group stage will give our younger players great experience going forward, I believe in the future this will help us climb the Fifa ranking table and hopefully one day put us in a better position to compete at World Cup level.”

Constantine expects the match to be tighter than most Indians expect. “I think Bangladesh are quite a good side, they’re more organised than they were before. I think it will be a tough game for India, they should be a little bit cautious. I think India will win but I don’t think it will be as easy as people think that it’s going to be.”