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Jamshedpur FC Head Coach Scott Cooper spoke to the media ahead of the all-important clash against Odisha FC.
On his analysis of the last few games…
We conceded two goals in the North East game but that was one or two particular players that didn’t do the jobs right and they’ve been told they let the team down that day. They know exactly who they are. You can’t expect your team to always keep clean sheets. We defended well. It was just a little bit of fatigue at the end there that they got in. A little bit lucky. I mean ask yourself what did Goa create other than long balls. That’s all we saw from them. We didn’t see much else in creativity. They got in behind. You know it was a little skirmish and these things can happen at the end of the game. But I think the bigger question is did we respond? and yeah we responded. Did the officials respond? They responded in a way I’ve never seen before.
On how optimistic he is to change the tides…
Well you know me, I’m confident in my players and confident in myself. Everybody has identified that we play a good brand of football. I don’t think there is a team in this league that possesses the ball as well as we do. I’ll be honest. We have faced teams that go into a block, and teams that don’t have the composure that we have. The difference with us is we have the ultimate composure. We have the composure in the defensive and the middle. We need to bring more composure in the final third. It’s a bit of a combination of three things. Number one, we are making bad decisions. Number two, we are rushing at chances, and number three, maybe there is a tweak we can do offensively to give ourselves a little bit more. You can see a lot of our chances come from wide play so maybe some more central attacks will help us. I’ve heard this so many times from the media, fans, and other coaches. They are in the wrong place on the table. It is nice to hear, right? It’s nice to hear and they are probably right but tables are the only truth in football. It’s the truth. It’s the only truth in football if there is truth in how the game is managed. I could point to Punjab FC. Disallowed goals, penalties not given. They could be totally in a different place. Most of the teams like Kerala and Goa win by a single goal. We’ve lost by a single goal. There is a finite difference in what happens and so when you lose 3 or 4, what can you say? When you are losing by one and there are contentious decisions that continue to happen, you have to ask yourself if you look at all the goals we have scored, or against us, or things that have been disallowed or penalties not given, you have to ask yourself if there was VAR, how would the tables look? I can guarantee you, nothing like they do now. So as a coach, I say to myself, what can I do? We have a brand of football that is very good. Everyone can see it. I believe our possession is an example to Indian football. If you want to go play international football, learn how to keep the ball, have a relationship with the ball, don’t just smash it. I think we have a good example of how to keep the ball. We’ve got a bad example of how to snatch at chances and not stay composed in the last third, which we as a team have to rectify. As a coach, I have to give us a little bit more options, but we need to take a look at that. There is a comment about the table, it’s true. We could easily be second or third In the league right now, as much as we are in the league right now. We could easily be in tenth place. It’s not a time to panic either. Tables don’t mean anything until March or April time in any case. If you look at everything that’s transpired, I always say tables are the truth, but in this league, I say they’re probably not.
On keeping the morale high of the players…
It’s just experience as a coach. I won’t let us lose confidence or enthusiasm or bravery or morale, because it’s just how you lead the team yourself. It’s what we do. Our players know exactly what we’re good at. We know exactly what we need to improve on. We know exactly what’s happened to us in games. We speak the truth. We play truthfully. We try to play good football that our fans can enjoy. We know we need to improve in this area. We know how good we’re looking in aspects of the game. And we know what’s happened to us that’s been hard against us as well. And so our players, you might think, oh, they’ve lost three games. We’ve lost by a single goal. Remember what we did with Mohun Bagan SG. In the last 20 minutes, they couldn’t get out of their half. Even when we played with 10 men. Last game, we had 56% possession, 100 passes more than Goa. At North East, we were winning until the 92nd minute. This is not a team that’s struggling.
This is a team that’s had some bad fortune with one or two players that have let us down at moments tactically. This is a team that’s had some bad decisions against them. And it’s a team that’s consequences are a direct result of us not doing our job in the last third. In the middle two-thirds, defensive middle third, we’re a nine out of ten team. In the last third, we’re probably three out of ten. We’re a nine out of ten then. That’s how it describes us. We’re probably a three-out-of-ten team in the last third. We’re a nine out of ten in the other two. But we still create chances. It’s just the chances we create, maybe they could have been a better one if the selection was right. Maybe we could be more composed in the finishing. So I’m not worried because we continue to play our brand of football, which is a good football. We continue to create chances. I have to help the team in the last third. We have to match what we do in other aspects of the game there. And then hope, hope to God that we get some fairness.
Affect on players after the loss…
Of course, because the longer you go without winning, the more anxious you become to win, correct? But that’s where you come down to your experience with your playing staff. You make sure that they stay composed. We don’t have emergency meetings and oh, we need to change the formation. We need to do this. We keep putting layers. We don’t change who we are, or what we do. We know this is a fight, right? If we get it right in the last third, many teams will be big prize winners. Yeah. And they have problems with us. Big, big problems, right? And if we could match that with at times some officiating that is at least 50-50, we’ll accept that. Yeah. But even 60-40, would be nice.
On injury concerns…
Pronay is out for the season. He’s had a surgery. You all knew that. Which is a sad loss because he’s an influential player. He was playing very well, Pronay fit perfectly in the balance, especially with this Jeremy. It was a nice combination. So we had to readjust. And again, I know the younger players come in. Ritwik Das continues to work on his recovery and rehab. He’s not ready. He tried to come back in North East. It didn’t work. Everybody could see that. And so he’s continuing to work. We don’t really know where he is. He could be a couple of weeks away. He is not ready to play in an ISL game at full power. We might not see the best of Ritwik until the resumption of the ISL in the new year. Because there’s only three or four weeks to go. He needs some closed-door games now. He needs those minutes. He needs to be up and down. He had a knee issue. Now he’s got a compensatory calf issue that’s come alongside. Usually when you come back from an injury, something else goes around it. And he’s just dealing with that. He’s just got to get his head down. And he’s got to work on those aspects. There’s no doubt he’s a talented boy. We need to make sure the next time he comes back he’s fully ready. So he might get some moments on the bench between now and the new year. He might not. But one thing’s for sure. He’ll get some closed-door games behind the scenes. I didn’t really work with Ritwik that much. He was in pre-season. He had one game against Bengaluru. He still has some work to do tactically. There’s no doubt about that. He’s got talent. And he’s got pace. But he’s still got a lot of work to do tactically. I’ve seen the games from last year. I’ve seen the moments and the flashes of brilliance. Those moments that can change a game. Maybe those moments could have helped us in the last third here or there. But those moments are in possession. You’re only going to have possession 40 seconds in a game. It’s 89 minutes and 20 other seconds that you’ve got to contribute to. And so I’m looking forward to seeing Ritwik back so that we can assess him tactically too. The truth is, Pronay is the biggest loss. Because he brought a steely structure to the middle of midfield. He’s vocal. He’s a real leader. And that was a hard loss for us because he’s competitive. I think he was the fastest guy to accumulate three yellow cards. Which kind of just shows his aggression and tenacity. It was a good combination of him and Jeremy. So we’ve had to restructure that. It would have probably enabled us to do other things higher up the pitch with him. You’ve seen at times Rei’s been with Jeremy whereas it might have released Rei to be higher with Pronay there. And these are kind of snowball effects of what could have happened in that last third. So I’d say we look forward to Pronay coming back next season. He’s such a good man. He’s in constant touch. He cares about the team. He updates us even now on his rehab. And he’s supportive of the team. He’s still a leader, even from his bed. We won’t replace Pronay because he’s still under contract. And he’s an important part of the club.
On his plans for the transfer window…
Every club should look to upgrade, right? You have so long with your iPhone. You know, your apps, need upgrading, right? So you upgrade, right? It’s no different with a football club. You’re always looking to improve things. So this football club should be no different in January and in June. I didn’t come here to stand still. I came here to put the philosophy in. Some players fit into it. Some players clearly wouldn’t. Some players don’t want to. So you’re always taking a look at that. So we’ll keep making new acquisitions just to try and get it right over… You know, you might not see the best until two or three transfer windows have gone, right? It could be two transfer windows that you see, okay, that’s a squad as we want both domestic and foreign players. You just don’t know. So the answer to that is, yeah, absolutely. We’ll look. We’ll look to see what we can do. How can we improve? Does he fit the philosophy of the play? Like, is he good in possession? Is he tactically aware? Does he work hard? They’re the big questions that we have to ask. So, of course, you know, I look at other ISL games. I even look at the I-League, which is an interesting league to me because there are some teams that I’ve watched and, you know, I’ve raised my eyebrows at one or two players, whoa, okay, that’s interesting. And then I’ve gone back to rewatch. So you never know, right? Because every young player has to come from somewhere and get a start from someplace.
On the announcement of the Super Cup…
It comes with an AFC place so it must be respected. There’s an advantage to clubs like us. We don’t have any national team players. Mumbai, Mohan Bagan, will have players in the Asian Cup. So Lord knows what they’re thinking and if I’m their coach I’m saying what? So we’re being punished for having players on the national team, right? So I guess from that perspective it comes with an AFC spot which is good and it comes with a slight advantage, some of their strongest players won’t be there. Which is surprising, to say the least to me. Does it affect us? No. We have to be careful how we approach that because let’s say we lost Jeremy or any other player. We lose our senior player in the Super Cup and then we get back to the ISL we’re in trouble. Do you go for it, do you rest or do you do a balance? And so I think we have to kind of get the mix right and the minutes right. And you have to just gauge those tournaments to see does it looks, can we see a pathway to winning it? If we can see a pathway to it we carry on. If the pathway is looking more and more challenging maybe at that point you back off and keep players ready for the ISL. But it’s a difficult one. It’s also difficult because it’s thrust upon you essentially at the last minute. So we have to address that as a club. I was surprised, I understand why it’s been done to finish the season early. But I’m not sure I’d be the happiest coach on earth if I was the Mumbai or Mohun Bagan coach. I’d be thinking Mohun Bagan is about eight or ten internationals, right? Yeah, probably on the national team squad in that pool that’s going to the Asian Cup. I hope they’re in our group, you know? But it’s a tough one.
On Vishal and Rehenesh…
As for Vishal and TP, we’ll have to wait and see on that one. Because Vishal came in and did a tremendous job. It was a good game because we had a lot of good possession. It was a good game because I don’t think Goa tested as much in that sense. They just threw balls long. Which was kind of a surprise from them. You’d expect more football from a league leader than what we saw. It was just more direct football straight down the middle. This took me by surprise because their goalkeeper didn’t build from the back once. It just went long. We got Vishal into the game for the first 15 or 20 minutes and let him go long until he felt comfortable. And then he played. And you could see his feet were very good. Some of the distance on the kicks was fantastic. But you can’t put a price on the experience that TP has got. And if we’re being totally honest, in the first six games of the league, TP has been the best keeper in the league. So, should he be punished for a red card that he probably shouldn’t have got?
On continuing Pratik Chaudhari as the captain of the team…
Our band doesn’t mean nothing to me because Jeremy is as much the captain as anybody else so is Elsinho, Dinpuia who is silent but performs. So different players have different vocals. Pratik led us out last time because Alen wasn’t in the line-up. If Alen plays, it would be him. If Alen didn’t play and TP plays, it would be TP. If not, probably Pratik. It doesn’t matter because there are different forms of captaincy. There is a captain that leads on the field, by example. There is one that drives people verbally.
Message for the Fans…
I see them on the street, shops, and they appreciate the football. Some of the fans say, don’t worry, we’re with you because we like the football. This is football we want to see. So you have to have a deep appreciation when fans are like that because many football fans in other stadiums, in other cities are very fickle. The team loses, they don’t show up. The team loses, the coach is an idiot. The player is terrible. Our fans are looking objectively at the game and saying we’re enjoying the football. And they keep coming back.
