Thomas Brdaric: We will come back strong

The Chennaiyin FC tactician also shed light on the injury concerns of the side.

Chennaiyin FC will be playing the fourth home match of ISL 2022-23 and are yet to win a match in front of the home fans. After a heavy defeat against Mumbai City FC (2-6), the home team will look to come back to winning ways. Thomas Brdaric's side currently occupy the 7th spot with seven points in the points table and win win boost the morale of the side for sure!

Prior to the fixture, head coach Thomas Brdaric and defender Ajith Kumar addressed the media. Here's what they had to say!

Learnings from the previous match against MCFC

Chennaiyin FC was leading in the last encounter against MCFC 2-0 but the Islanders were quick enough to equalize in the first half itself. At the end of the match, Mumbai scored six goals, the highest scored in the league so far.

Brdaric said, "The last match was very tough to analyse as we played well in the first 30 minutes and then we conceded the first goal pretty quickly due to a lack of organization. Now we know where we made mistakes and have analysed them and also this is not the end of the year or the end of the world. Every club goes through this and we will come back strong.”

Thoughts on Jamshedpur FC

Jamshedpur FC after winning the ISL Shield last year are off to a poor start in ISL 2022-23, losing three out of the five matches played. They are currently in the ninth position with just four points.

Thomas Brdaric asserted, “Jamshedpur is the current champion but has made a lot of changes to the team and has a different team and is also struggling a bit.”

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Changes in the number of foreign players playing in the centre-back position

Chennaiyin FC, in the five matches played so far, have fielded three foreigners in the centre-back role - Fallou Diagne, Julius Duker, and Vafa Hakhamaneshi. They are yet to deploy an Indian centre-back in the league.

The German tactician stated, “We always have to look at playing the best XI during the matchdays and the two foreign backs have provided good stability. Everybody will get the opportunity to play and have to prove themselves and deliver for the team. For me, it doesn't matter who is starting in the XI unless they play well. We have tried different options in the training sessions this week and hope it succeeds.”

Injury Updates

Kwame Karikari along with Romario have not been in the matchday squads for the past few games. Notably, Kwame Karikari started the league well, scoring the opening goal of the season for Chennaiyin FC.

Thomas Brdaric commented, “We have the last training session today afternoon and will decide which players are fit to play. Tomorrow’s game will be played from 5.30 PM rather than the usual 7.30 PM start. We have enough players on the bench who are hungry to play, given a chance. Kwame Karikari looked good in the last few training sessions and we will take a final call on him at the end of today’s training session.”

Ajith Kumar's thoughts on the heavy defeat against MCFC

Ajith Kumar shared his thoughts on the previous defeat, "It is totally our mistake as we didn't play well in the last game. The first 30 minutes went in our favour but soon we started to lose possession after conceding the first goal which frustrated many. We have now made sure not to repeat the same mistakes going forward.”

Lost against Mumbai due to home crowd pressure?

All the matches Chennaiyin FC have won this season have been away games and both at the Salt Lake Stadium in Kolkata. In the home matches, the Marina Machans have lost two and drawn one.

The right-back asserted, “We cannot say it is due to pressure. In the three matches we have played so far at home, we have dominated the first game against Bengaluru FC and to an extent against FC Goa as well. In the last match, we made too many defensive errors which cost us the match. We are now fully focused on the next match rather than thinking about the previous ones.”