Scout Report: How does Mandar Rao Desai fit into FC Goa's plans?

Mandar Rao Desai is a promising youngster with a lot of potential

Mandar Rao Desai is one of the promising young talents from Mapusa, Goa and is making a name for himself on the left-flank. The quick-footed winger made 11 appearances for The Gaurs last season and is expected to feature regularly in the first team in the second edition of the ISL.

Background

Desai made his professional debut for Dempo in the 2013-14 I-League on 22 September 2013 against Shillong Lajong at the Duler Stadium.

He captained Goa-India during the 2014 Lusofonia Games where he made four appearances and scored once. Goa won the Gold Medal beating the Under-20 team of Mozambique in the final. Desai made his India U23 debut in the 2014 Asian Games against UAE U23.

Strengths and Weaknesses

The 23-year-old winger has glimpses of Arjen Robben in him. Standing at 5’7”, he covers the ground very quickly thanks to his short stature and blistering pace. He is gifted with great body balance and excellent acceleration which allow him to take on any full-backs easily. His dribbling abilities are already top notch, almost flawless.

His style of play induces the defenders to take out a lazy foot and help him win a foul. His change of pace and extremely skillful nature makes it very difficult for the defenders to catch hold of him. He is also a decent set-piece taker, especially for corner routines.

Like all the modern wingers, Desai loves to cut inside and have a go from distance. His lethal shooting technique and finishing make him a complete goal scoring package. The Indian youth international never hurries into attempting a pass. He always looks around for options before making a pass.

His wise head and clear thought process play a big part in his passing, an attribute for which he has credited his youth team coaches. He has a good variety of passes. He also averages an impressive 70.58% shot-on-target accuracy in Season One of the ISL. What’s beautiful to see is the ease with which he can thread a defence-splitting through ball.

Desai is positive and comfortable on the ball and is rarely seen in a clumsy position. He doesn't fuss about having defenders hanging around his shoulders and is simply able to out-paces most of them. The FC Goa winger is always on the move, you can see him moving around always, looking out for space on the pitch, calling out for balls from the deep.

Although he is short, it’s difficult to tackle him because of his sudden burst of speed and tricky play. Desai is that sort of player who you will enjoy watching day in, day out. Still raw, yet it's quite visible how much talent he has whenever one sees him on the pitch.

Defensively, Desai doesn’t offer as much protection as one would like. His work-rate is fairly decent. One of his drawbacks is that he over-complicates simple things, he tends to overdo stuff which isn’t required. He has acknowledged that he still has to learn to keep things simple.

Also, he tends to take one touch too many, often resulting in the loss of possession. Maintaining his concentration can also be a problem when things aren’t going Desai’s way.

However, most of these drawbacks can be attributed to the lack of experience. He is only going to learn and improve with more games at a higher level, and with proper guidance.

What can Desai offer FC Goa?

Zico recently said that the left-footed winger needed to bulk up a bit so that he is not forced off the ball by stronger defenders. The tricky winger has a lot of skills in his armoury and is known to use his pace and dribbling to take on the full-backs. Adding a bit more of physicality to his game would help the 23-year-old to take his game to the next level.

The youngster still has a lot to learn and Zico would be expecting the youngster to chip in with a couple of goals and assists as the team looks to improve upon last season’s semi-final appearance.

With the squad looking stronger than it did last season, the competition for places will be more in the second edition and one would hope that the diminutive youngster would use that pressure to take his game to the next level.