Jose Molina reveals Mohun Bagan's tactics against FC Ravshan after AFC Champions League Two draw

Jose Molina was happy with his players performance in a tight game.

Jose Molina’s Mohun Bagan failed to get their first win of the 2024-25 AFC Champions League Two campaign as they played out an eventful 0-0 draw against Ravshan Kulob on Wednesday (18 September). Despite having a flurry of big goal-scoring chances in the final phase of the match, the Mariners players horribly lacked their finishing shoes and couldn’t capitalize on the big moments.

Even though they failed to score a goal, Mohun Bagan also kept a clean sheet after conceding nine goals in their last four matches before this. Ravshan hardly crated a few chances, with the Kolkata giants looking strong and assertive at the back to get the clean sheet.

After the match, Jose Molina revealed that he planned for his players to use the hot & humid weather of Kolkata to their advantage against the Tajikistan club. He hinted at how Mohun Bagan might use this weather advantage as a potential weapon against teams not used to such conditions, stating: “In the pre-match meeting we did yesterday, I told the players that the opponents come from a country which is cold and dry weather.

“Here it’s hot and humid, so keep calm, keep the ball, move the ball around patiently and they will give your opportunities in the end. We did get the chances in the end, but finally we couldn’t score,” Jose Molina further claimed.

Molina appears to indicate here that he purposefully ensured that his players took it easy and played out the first half in a slow and frustrating manner before upping the tempo in the second half. “Of course, the Ravshan players were exhausted after the hour mark and let their guard down, allowing Mohun Bagan to create a big number of goal-scoring chances in the final minutes.

Unfortunately, the likes of Jason Cummings, Dimitri Petratos and Liston Colaco all missed big one-v-one scoring opportunities to deny the Mariners a late win.”

But it appears that Mohun Bagan might go with this kind of an approach in further ACL Two games or when lining up against teams who are not at all suited to playing football for a lengthy period of time in exhaustive humid conditions.

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