Amrinder Singh


Amrinder Singh is an Indian footballer who plays as a goalkeeper for both the Mumbai City and the Indian national team.

Early years

Amrinder was born on 27 May 1993 in Mahilpur, Punjab, India. Amrinder took up the game of football at a young age but did not play consistently till the age of 15 when he joined his schools' government ran academy, Sports Wing Academy in Paldi, Hoshiarpur in Punjab. Initially Amrinder started at the under-17 level as a striker at Sports Wing Academy but his coach, Yarvinder Singh, noticed that Amrinder had a good build and reach, and encouraged him to be a goalkeeper. He started excelling as a goalkeeper and stayed at the Sports Wing Academy for another two years. While still at Sports Wing, however Amrinder was selected by the Punjab Football Association to represent the Punjab state national team at the under-17 and under-19 levels. His greatest achievement while with the Punjab team was when he helped Punjab win the BC Roy Trophy. After winning the BC Roy Trophy, he was advised by former Pune player Asim Hassan's father, a well-known coach in Punjab, to trial at the Pune Academy. He passed the trail and was placed in the under-19 squad.

Club career

Pune

After joining the Pune Academy and showing off his goalkeeping skills during the summer of 2011, Singh was selected to join the first team squad of Pune at the age of 18. This thus made him the club's youngest ever Academy product. He soon made his debut as well for Pune when he came on as a substitute during the 2011 Indian Federation Cup after Indian international Subrata Pal came off against East Bengal. Pune lost the match 1–2 but with Singh only conceding one of those goals. Singh then made his I-League debut for Pune coming on as a substitute for Shahinlal Meloly in the 21st minute against East Bengal. Pune lost the match 1–3 with all three goals coming after Amrinder came on. After one more game for Pune in which Amrinder conceded three goals, Pune FC brought in East Bengal goalkeeper Abhra Mondal on loan for the rest of the season.
Mondal kept Amrinder on the bench for two months till 28 January 2012 when he got injured against Shillong Lajong in an I-League match, when he was subbed-on and kept a clean-sheet. On 5 February 2012 Singh kept his first full clean-sheet of his career against then league leaders Dempo as Pune went on to win the match 1–0.

2013–2014 season

Amrinder began the 2013–14 I-League season as Pune's No. 1 goalkeeper when he started in their first league match of the season against Mohammedan at the Salt Lake Stadium. During the match Singh gave away a goal to Josimar as Pune went on to win 3–1. After that match, Singh and Pune went on a run of clean-sheets, keeping five of them in a row before conceding two goals to Sporting Goa on 2 November 2013. It was also in this match that Singh received a red card in the 81st minute after he brought down the last man on the ball for Sporting Goa.
On 29 January 2014, Singh made his international club debut for Pune in their AFC Champions League qualifier tie against Hanoi T&T. he played the full 90 in goal for Pune but could not stop Pune from giving away three goals in a 3–0 defeat.

2014–2015 season

Amrinder kicked off the 2015 season, in a one all draw against Salgaocar. He was then give then Hero of the match award for his wonderful saves against Bengaluru FC.

ATK (loan)

Having signed for ATK for the 2015 Indian Super League season on loan from Pune, Amrinder started every match in league except one and got his first clean sheet against Goa.
2016 season
Bengaluru
He signed for Bengaluru on loan from Pune, and went on to win best goalkeeper of the I-League award with nine clean sheets under his belt, while also impressing at the AFC Cup, leading to his loan move being made permanent for the 2016–17 season.

International career

Amrinder represented India U23 during the 2014 Asian Games and was the starting 'keeper in both of India's games. He was named the captain for India U23s for the 2016 AFC U-23 championship qualifiers in Bangladesh and started in India U23s 2–0 loss to Uzbekistan U23 on 27 March 2015.
On 19 August 2017 Singh made his international debut for the senior team against Mauritius which ended in a 2–1 win for India.

Career statistics