Oscar Bruzon highlights East Bengal's mistakes that led to loss against Mumbai City

East Bengal now have 10 losses in their account in ISL 2024-25.

East Bengal suffered the ultimate heartbreak as they sustained a 3-2 defeat to Mumbai City in the Indian Super League (ISL) on Monday (6 January). Despite coming back from being 2-0 down to making it 2-2, a late winner from Nikolas Karelis helped the Islanders leave Kolkata with all three points.

Oscar Bruzon was disappointed with how his side gave away the game after working hard to make a comeback, as he reflected after the match.

“We are a team who has a lot of problems in controlling games. We are reactive. That is why we try to play in the middle of the pitch. If we want to control the game through the control of the ball with possession and combinations, we struggle. It seems that when we get the desired result, our team doesn’t know how to control games any more. We are more of a reaction-based team and we are punished when we play with an open heart,” he said.

“We need to understand all the moment. We are a much better team when we are losing games than how we are when we are drawing games or when we are ahead. This is something we have to look to improve because to win games, it’s not possible for needing to score 3-4 goals to do so.

“We had a very good stage in the end of December when we looked a very solid unit, but in the last few weeks, we have developed a problem in midfield, not only in the defence. The lack of concentration today is evident, even after coming back and all the hard work of bringing the fans on our side, that mistake is a bit frustrating,” he also added.

On how East Bengal can cope without Saul Crespo

The Spanish gaffer also gave a pessimistic reply on the injury recovery of Saul Crespo and how his side, East Bengal can cope up without him, stating: “He can’t be fully fit for a few weeks. We have Jeakson Singh and Sauvik Chakrabarti in midfield, depending on the games. Our team plays much better with a foreigner in front of the pivot. Saul is a key player for us.

“We are trying to find the solutions and every game it looks we are not finding consistency in midfield. Jeakson didn’t have his best game today against Mumbai, as he’s a natural midfielder and Sauvik struggled with an ankle problem all the week before this game. This is our real picture. We need to try to control all the areas. It’s not enough in the long term to play with an open heart all the time,” he finished with.

East Bengal will face off against rivals Mohun Bagan in the Kolkata Derby in their next ISL clash on 11 January.

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