How East Bengal can fix their goal-scoring issue in final stretch of ISL campaign?

East Bengal have scored only 18 goals in 18 games so far in ISL.

The odds are firmly stacked against East Bengal heading into the final stretch of the 2024-25 Indian Super League (ISL) season. The Red & Gold Brigade are currently 10 points behind a possible playoffs spot and have six more matches remaining in the league phase.

It will take a bit of a miracle for East Bengal to actually reach the playoff spot. To do so, they need to win at least five, if not all six, of their remaining matches to put pressure on those above them. To win matches, the Torchbearers need to score goals on a consistent basis and that has become a problem in recent weeks.

East Bengal have failed to score a goal in three of their last four ISL games and are underperforming in front of the opposition goal in the worst possible period. Only Hyderabad FC and Mohammedan Sporting have scored fewer goals than them in the league.

It’s quite clear that unless Oscar Bruzon can fix his side goals issue, they won’t be able to finish off the season with a bang. Here are a few ways their goal-scoring issues can potentially be resolved.

3. Encourage wingers to frequently get into the opposition box

A possible reason why East Bengal are struggling to score in the ISL is perhaps because of an overreliance on goals from strikers. Unfortunately, neither Dimitrios Diamantakos nor Cleiton Silva have been especially prolific this season. The Red & Gold Brigade need to rely on other players to deliver the goods and focus on getting goals from multiple players around the team.

A way they can put their opposition under even more pressure is perhaps by urging their wingers to make more runs into the box. For that, they’ll need to urge the wing-backs to roam forward more often and take up the wide areas, which can allow the wingers to drift in centrally to torment the defenders. PV Vishnu has already been a standout by scoring four key goals in the ISL this season.

Richard Celis might yet to score, but he has that explosiveness to torment the opposition goalkeepers. Crowding the opposition box with wingers can help create more goal-scoring options for East Bengal and help them unlock their rivals’ defensive shape better.

2. Be more prolific from set-pieces

East Bengal doesn’t always need to focus on sensational, free-flowing attacking football when looking for goals in their upcoming matches. There are other options when it comes to ousting the opposition team, and a key aspect of that are set-pieces.

In the ISL this season, 120 goals have been scored from set-piece situations itself, but not that many of them have come from East Bengal. To their credit, the Red & Gold Brigade showed their prowess in these situations in the 2-1 win over Kerala Blasters through Hijazi Maher’s winner. But consistency is key for them to become a major threats from corners or free-kicks. Fortunately for East Bengal, they already have set-piece specialists in Naorem Mahesh Singh and Cleiton Silva.

Bruzon needs to work hard on these situations in getting the rest of the players synchronized with these creative outlets and learn how to get at the end of set-pieces ahead of opposition players. East Bengal’s rivals Mohun Bagan have proven how set-pieces can be a big asset, having scored 19 goals from those situations this season. It’s time the Red & Gold Brigade works on improving their set-piece threat to fix their goals issue.

1. Tweak the formation

Oscar Bruzon has already proven to be quite flexible in terms of being able to switch up his system whenever necessary to get the best out of the East Bengal squad. Unfortunately for him, constant injury issues have held him back from being able to use his strongest XI and that is why he’s constant changing things.

Well, it might be time for the Spanish coach to slightly tweak his formation once again to get the best out of his players. Rather than going with a 4-2-3-1 or 4-4-1-1 formation, it’d be smarter for East Bengal to go with an old-school 4-4-2 approach in the remainder of the campaign.

In this aspect, both Dimitrios Diamantakos as well as forwards like new signing Raphael Messi Bouli, Cleiton Silva and David Lalhlansanga can be encouraged to roam around the final third in the attacking moves. This would perhaps put a bit more defensive pressure on the midfielders, but can allow East Bengal to attack with more numbers.

In a two-striker formation, East Bengal can have more bodies in the key attacking areas and allow the likes of Diamantakos and Lalhlansanga to get at the end of chances better. That can perhaps have a positive impact on their goal-scoring ability and help them take opposition defenders by surprise too.

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