Manolo Marquez: After two defeats, we needed to win a game

The Nizams got back to winning ways in style against the Marina Machans.

Hyderabad FC secured a 3-1 win away from home against Chennaiyin FC at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium, Chennai on Saturday. The reigning Indian Super League (ISL) Trophy winners managed to break a streak of two defeats in a row in the ongoing ISL 2022-23 season. Goals from Halicharan Narzary, Chinglensana Singh and Borja Herrera were enough to secure three points. It was also only the third occasion where Manolo Marquez's side scored more than once in a single ISL fixture.

The head coach spoke to the media after seeing his side record a sixth win of the season from the first nine games. Here are the excerpts from the conversation:

The win was needed

Talking about snapping the losing streak, Manolo Marquez said, “I think when you are in a bad moment, you need to win one game. We know perfectly our first half was not good. It is true that Chennaiyin had more of the ball but the clear chances were for our team in the first half. In the second half, we controlled the situation better and at that moment, I repeat, after two defeats we needed to win one game and continue.”

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• Hyderabad FC beat Chennaiyin FC to get back to winning ways
• Ratings: Borja, Halicharan impress as Hyderabad FC vanquish Chennaiyin FC

Fantastic attitude in training

The tactician praised the efforts of the players in the training session leading up to the match. Explaining what went right during the win, he said, “The attitude in the training sessions was fantastic. But, in the first half, we know that we are after two defeats and it's true that we did not control the game. If we are compact, defend in a good way when we recover the ball, we will have a lot of spaces and we did this in the second half, not in the first half. We had to take advantage of these offensive players (Chennaiyin FC players) with the spaces that they have in the defensive part.”

Important to score multiple goals

Uncharacteristically, HFC have struggled to score goals this season. Talking about the importance of today’s result and scoring three goals, Manolo Marquez said, “Very important because, in the last six-seven games, we scored 1-0, we won in Guwahati 3-0 then four consecutive wins 1-0. Then, the two defeats were the same, 1-0. It was important to score goals because we were the team with more goals. We don’t want to compare because every season is different, but we were a team which scored goals last season.”