ISL 2022-23: Not about the way you win matches, but three points: ATK Mohun Bagan’s Juan Ferrando

ATK Mohun Bagan’s boss Juan Ferrando was pleased after his team defeated Jamshedpur FC by 1-0 at the Vivekananda Yuba Bharati Krirangan, Kolkata on Thursday. The match was poised at 0-0 but the Mariners were able to get the penalty in the stoppage time, which Hugo Boumous converted to earn three crucial points for his team.

Ferrando reckons the team failed to create spaces but he was happy with the victory. The Mariners took a total of eight shots on target but they couldn’t create many serious chances. ATK Mohun Bagan also had 83% passing accuracy and dominated the possession with 56%.

However, Juan Ferrando was once again not pleased with the performance of his team despite the win.

Speaking at the post-match press conference, Juan Ferrando said, “Not at all. We did not play well in the first half. Their situation was difficult and we played with the foreign players – Carl (McHugh) and Dimitri (Petratos), who were playing with some problems. The last two days in training were difficult for them and we had only one fully-fit foreign player (Boumous). Manvir (Singh), (Florentin) Pogba and (Joni) Kauko are out due to injuries so it has been difficult for the team to train in the last few days because we need maximum time to prepare for the matches. But that’s not an excuse.”

He added, “We tried to find the best system to help the team find the spaces. In the first half, we couldn’t find the spaces, and we misplaced easy passes. Maybe, we were under pressure or the mentality was not good. But in the second half, the team was much better. They controlled the spaces, the time and in case, Jamshedpur FC had only one chance in the last minute. But in the final third, it was difficult to find the spaces, and maybe because Eli Sabia and Peter Hartley have good experience as center-backs and they controlled the spaces.”

Meanwhile, ATK Mohun Bagan has injury woes in the squad and the Spaniard added it is not easy to prepare as they don’t have enough fit players.

Ferrando said, “It’s difficult because it’s not possible to prepare the team all the time. You have 22-23 players in a squad to prepare the matches and when you have 12-15 players it becomes difficult. But in this case, it’s necessary to talk about the character of the players. They showed the personality to control the spaces in difficult moments and continue working in the build up. This is our mentality and we won’t change that. When the situation is not good, you have to continue working.”

ATK Mohun has won their last three matches by a margin of 1-0 but Ferrando feels it is imperative his team has got nine points from these games, which has lifted them to third place in the standings.

When asked if Ferrando is worried that the team hasn’t been able to score more goals, he said, “In the end, it’s three points. It’s not about the way you win matches, but the three points. For me, the problem is if our opponents create chances. In our case, we did create many clear chances except for two-three occasions. For the rest of the match, it was difficult to find spaces. For Jamshedpur FC, after the substitution of Rafael (Crivellaro), they couldn’t create many opportunities and the normal score would have been 0-0.”

ATK Mohun Bagan will next lock horns against Odisha FC on 15th December at the Kalinga Stadium, Bhubaneswar.