Manolo Marquez: Aridane Santana is a very important player for us

The Nizams came from behind to edge the Red and Gold for their first win in four games.

Hyderabad FC thumped SC East Bengal in an entertaining game which ended in a 3-2 win for the Manolo Marquez led team. East Bengal were a goal ahead at the half-time but the Nizams started the second-half aggressively as their captain Aridane Santana, scored two quick fire goals in a space of 40 seconds. 

Halicharan Narzary scored the third goal before Maghoma pulled one back in the 81st minute. However, it wasn’t enough for the visitors to salvage a point.

Hyderabad FC head coach Manolo Marquez praised Aridane while speaking to the media and said, “Aridane is our #9 and all the other teams have players like Valskis, Le Fondre, Angulo but he has now scored four goals in four games and last game he couldn’t play but he is a very important player to us.”

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGzMl1_I-y8

What went wrong in the first-half?

The Spaniard then elaborated about his half time talk and quoted, “I think we didn’t deserve to lose (trail) in the first half. We missed a lot of chances in the first half, even a penalty. In football sometimes this kind of thing happens and in the half time we were quiet, we spoke about the game and decided to play the second half in the same way as first and we will score goals. Goodluck happened to us and we scored the second goal in the next minute after the equalizer.”

Impact Player – Liston Colaco

Along with Aridane, Liston Colaco was the star of the game as the young winger ran riot in the opposition half, bagging two assists after his introduction in the game at half-time. “Liston is a very very good player but sometimes, you need to have a player on the bench that you can use after opposition is tired and with Liston, you have more possibility that his performances are okay, even better,” Manolo Marquez mentioned.

Turning it around

When questioned to summarize his side's performance in the second-half, he answered, “We were losing but we were calm because the team was playing very good. We created many clear chances and if we continue the same way, we(could) lose but we tried.”

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Manolo Marquez continued, “It was very good until minute 35 of the second half. We struggled in the last 10 minutes because the team was very nervous but because after going 3-1 up and they scored the goal and you feel they will have some chances but fortunately for us, the final score was 3-2 for Hyderabad.”

Realted: Aridane brace as Hyderabad FC edge SC East Bengal in five-goal thriller

Related: Robbie Fowler: I’m just taking care of a team which was built for I-League

Unbeaten run

Hyderabad FC are yet to taste a defeat in the competition and when asked about it, Manolo Marquez expressed, “We are very very proud of our players. Everybody knows that we are playing with a lot of Indian guys because they have lots of traits, they have to continue fighting for the ball and it’s not easy. The only goal we can have right now is(to think about the game against) Mumbai.”

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