The Boss Spoke To Us Following His Side’s First Win On the Road, About The Mentality Of His Players, The Road Ahead And More…
On topping the table with a narrow win…
We know that we’re are top of the table only for the moment, because other teams have yet to play. But it was a very good result for us to break the dynamic that we were having in the away games. It has been a long time since we won a game away from home, but apart from that, we have been arriving to the last moments of the games in winning positions, and have conceded two goals in injury time, that have cost us four points.
My aim today was to talk to the players and inform them that should we arrive to that moment, we have to be mentally strong and try and hold on to the points. It’s been very hard for the team, because it has happened two times in such a short period. But we’ve worked the system in the last minutes, and I’m happy that it paid off. It was a game that they could have scored and made it 1-1, and we had our chances to make it 2-0. There were chances for both the teams and I have to congratulate Odisha, because they played a very good game.
On his side’s unbeaten run in the competition…
The unbeaten statistic makes us strong because football is in many parts a game that has a lot to do with mentality. For us being unbeaten is good. And to add to that, we have another clean sheet and have only conceded twice so far. It’s something that we are building for the future, because we know that it’s a very tough League. The target is to arrive to the playoffs and we know that nobody is going to give us the four points we lost in Hyderabad and Goa, which means that we have to make up for that with as many points as possible in the games to come.
On a solid defensive performance led by Gurpreet…
Gurpreet is having a good season. He has conceded only two goals and has made some really good saves. But it isn’t just him, the defenders have also been working hard. I think that we are a very compact team and we don’t give a lot of options to the forwards of the other team to score. We have been playing against Corominas, and he scored from a penalty, and even the likes of Asamoah Gyan and Marcelinho Leite haven’t scored. Today we had difficulties against Xisco, but we managed to keep him away as well, which means we are doing some good defensive work.
On the importance of not conceding late goals…
It is very important to break a dynamic like that, because it’s not only about the draw. It’s about throwing away what you’ve worked for so hard in the very last moments of a game. It creates something in your mind as a player, that you are not going to finish the game in the way that you want to finish it. It was really important to break that pattern and what’s important is to build up from now.
On a defender scoring the winning goal against Odisha…
Over the course of this week, we worked a lot on the 5-4-1 formation in defence, but we also have been working a lot on scoring goals in our training sessions. You have to try hard on the pitch but it’s also about taking quick decisions as well. Sometimes you will take better decisions and sometimes, not. Today we didn’t have as many chances we had in the last game, but that’s football. Sometimes, a 1-0 result is enough for you to become a champion. It has not been our best game, but we played really hard and we take this result for the team, because it helps us in the race to the playoffs, which is the primary target.
