Phil Brown: The most important positive is the character that we showed

The Englishman also felt his team showed too much respect to the opposition in the first half.

Hyderabad FC and ISL champions, Bengaluru FC, played out a 1-1 draw in Hyderabad, as a late Robin Singh equalizer saw Phil Brown’s men snatch a point from a game that they seemed destined to lose.

Phil Brown was open about his side’s performance so far in the ISL, in his post-match press conference. He said, "I think league tables don’t lie. I’m not here to say that we deserve to be anywhere else than where we are, unless you win games of football."

“We had a gameplan, playing against the league champions of last year. The gameplan was to frustrate them. Even though we were playing at home, we had a gameplan to allow them to have the ball in their own half.”

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The side from Hyderabad found themselves trailing to a Sunil Chettri goal, as early as the second minute.

“When we made the mistake in the first couple of minutes and you’re 0-1 down, the gameplan goes out the window. There was a lot spoken at half-time about commitment and desire. I pointed fingers at some big characters in the changing room. They have to understand that we are at the bottom of the league. They have to understand that everybody looks at that table.”

Impressed with squad's professionalism to go for the equalizer

The Hyderabad FC head coach, however, did commend the character his side showed to stay in the game and grab the draw.

“They also have to draw positives from today’s game and the most important positive is the character that we showed, even down to 10 men, playing against a very good team.”

Brown stated that his side were too respectful of Bengaluru in the first half, in which they were run off the pitch by the reigning champions. Phil Brown said, “There are certain things about Bengaluru to admire. But, you respect it to a certain extent, not all the way and I felt that everybody showed them too much respect in the first half.”

Ashish Rai came onto the pitch in the second half and did enough to stake a claim for a more prominent role in the side in future games. Brown spoke highly of the 20-year-old. “His energy levels, his pace, his physicality, everything about him is something to admire and something to like. But, he has to raise his game from a technical point of view.”

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'I don't find excuses, I find reasons'

Finally, the Englishman was asked if the reason behind Hyderabad’s poor performances was the fact that he had not been given as much time with his team as other managers had with theirs.

“I’m not here to sit and make excuses, I’m not that kind of manager or coach. I don’t know what the Indian word is for reason and the Indian word is for excuse, but in England, it is very very similar. I believe winners find reasons and losers find excuses.”

“There are a lot of reasons why we are where we are at this point of time and they are quite certainly not a lot to do with football.”

“I am here demanding the players to express themselves better than we did in the first half, but similar in terms of the character in the second half,” Phil Brown concluded.

Hyderabad FC take on FC Goa at home in their next match on 8th of December.