Thomas Brdaric: We will get opportunities to win

The tactician was happy with the performance of his players and remains hopeful in the forthcoming matches.

Chennaiyin FC held ATK Mohun Bagan to a goalless draw in their recent Indian Super League (ISL) 2022-23 fixture. Thomas Brdaric's side created better scoring chances than the visitors but the match did not produce a goal. Due to the close nature of the game, neither team was willing to take the risk of going away empty-handed and settled for a point each.

The head coach of the Marina Machans, Thomas Brdaric, talked to the reporters during the post-match press conference and answered some important questions. He presented his opinions and was of the belief that securing four points from two fixtures against the Mariners during the 2022-23 season was a positive for the team.

Here are the excerpts from the conversation:

Assessment of the game

Talking about the result and the team’s morale going forward, the tactician said, “ATKMB is a very strong team. It was an evenly balanced match where they could have scored or we could have scored. You saw two strong teams today. I am proud that we can compete with such teams and I hope that we still have the belief in six matches that are left. We will get opportunities to win.”

Not a bad result

The German believes that a draw is not the end of the world and the team has room for improvement. He said, “A draw is not bad. We can improve in some spells, and have better composure. There were too many loose balls today and we invited ATKMB to create opportunities. We gave them too much room…Both goalkeepers did a good job, Samik (Mitra) and Vishal (Kaith). Samik held us in the game,”

“If we want to take the next step, we have to win, score and capitalise on the mistakes of the opponent much better,” he further added.

No need to panic

Thomas Brdaric believes that his team does not need to play aggressively in order to seek wins in upcoming matches. He said, “We have to understand to not get punished by doing fooling things. In the last matches, we got close to winning, I was disappointed that we could not win against Jamshedpur FC. In all other games, the performance was good. The next match against Bengaluru FC is a very important one and maybe next week the situation will be much better.”