Robbie Fowler: We rely too much on Pilkington & Maghoma to score goals

The Englishman spoke after his side earned their first point of the season on Thursday.

SC East Bengal and Jamshedpur FC played out a lucksture goalless draw at the Tilak Maidan in Vasco. Both teams were down to 10 men at full-time after Eugeneson Lyngdoh received a second yellow card in the 24th minute, while Laldinliana Renthlei suffered the same fate in the dying moments of the game. The match was as usual marred by controversial refereeing decisions, which did not go down well with Red and Gold boss Robbie Fowler. 

He started off by saying, “I just told them to be good and I don’t think any decisions went our way, it just seems to be going against us. I told them to go and defend like the way we know we can and not concede. After three consecutive losses, it was a good point for us.”

When asked about the changes in his lineup, he replied, “We've had a few injuries and tried to use as many players that were available at our disposal. We never had a pre-season and are massively behind other clubs in terms of being ready.”

When questioned if he was happy with the point, the Englishman answered, “We are more than happy to get a point. We feel like we’re playing against 12 men in every single game. Last game we created chances, but today we got our man sent off and the gameplan went out of the window.”

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The Liverpool great hailed defender Mohammed Irshad’s performance and said, “He was very good. He has had a sloppy start, but he gave everything. I think he defended really well, nice and solid. He put in a solid shift and that’s what we expect from our defenders. We had to work very well as a team and he defended very well.”

Jacques Maghoma and Anthony Pilkington were left isolated in front of goal, as the Kolkata giants could not provide quality service for them to score goals. Speaking on it, Robbie Fowler quoted, “It’s no doubt that they are our star players and we rely too much on them to score goals. But, we try to substitute the players and help them out a little bit.”

“We have created chances in the past and we will score goals, but are still trying to get upto speed in terms of our fitness. The more games we play the better we look. We’re more than happy with the one point that we have got. We defend as a team and attack as a team.”

Lastly, Robbie Fowler also gave an update about Aaron Amadi-Holloway’s injury and said, “He is not too far away, but he’s still away due to a nasty ankle injury. We will keep monitoring him and he will come soon. I can’t tell you exactly when he’ll be back, but let’s get him at the training pitch and let him have comfortable training sessions,” he signed off.