Atlético de Kolkata reserved their spot in the finals of the Indian Super League (their second in three seasons) as they held Mumbai City FC to a 0-0 draw, at the latter’s home ground in the second leg of the semi-final.
Needing a draw to progress, the away side were compact and set up two lines of four, frustrating the men in blue all night long. Apart from Chhetri’s early opening, Mumbai hardly had a sniff at goal, and had to resort to playing horizontal passes for large parts of the match.
Asked if his players executed their game plan to perfection, Kolkata coach, José Molina said, “Yes in the second half but not in the first half. We were trying to do something different in the first half, we wanted to press them so that they didn’t have time to think on the ball.”
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Happy with the performance
“Something similar we did in Kolkata. We were not comfortable with the ball in the first 20-25 minutes. Later we started to play better. In the second half, we stayed together and closed down all spaces, the plan worked and I am absolutely happy,” he said.
The Spaniard made a whopping nine changes to his side that had secured a 3-2 victory over Mumbai in the first leg. According to Molina, one mustn't be surprised about this considering the format of the league.
“I tried to put the best 11 on the pitch. We played two days ago, and had to travel here. We didn’t have too much time to recover. We have many good players who didn’t play in the first leg – Javi Lara, Belencoso, Abinash, Pritam Kotal.”
“Why should I play with the same players? All of the players worked very hard since the first day. We will see who will play in the finals. We have to see how the players recover,” he explained.
All the fighting should take place on the pitch, feels Molina
Speaking about the scuffle that ensued on the pitch after the match, the coach said, ”I don’t know who started the fight. But that is absolutely bad, it’s not good for the game. We have to play and fight on the pitch. During 90 minutes you can try to win. After the match is finished, it’s finished.
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“We must say good job, great work and shake hands. We don’t have to fight and I don’t like that. One of my players is bleeding in the dressing room. I hope the league can watch what happened,” he went on to add.
Molina refused to predict the winner of the game between the Delhi Dynamos and Kerala Blasters, saying, “I don’t know. I am focused on my team. We watched the first leg between Delhi and Kerala. It was a very good game. The best part is that we will watch the match on the TV, relaxed.”
Asked if the red card helped his side to shore up their defence, the coach said, ”Do you think? To me, it’s always better to play with 11 players than 10. Maybe, with 10 players we were stronger in defence and Mumbai didn’t have the resources to beat our defence,” he concluded.
