For all their attacking flair, ATK Mohun Bagan lacked balance

For the second time in nine days, ATK Mohun Bagan (ATKMB) had to win by a margin of two goals. For the second time, they couldn’t. As the players collapsed on the pitch in Bambolim having given their all on a sticky Goa night to win 1-0, which counted for nothing as they needed another goal to take Hyderabad FC to extra-time, ATKMB’s second Indian Super League (ISL) season ended worse than their first. Runners-up in the 2020-21 ISL and second after the league phase, they had exited in the semi-final after ending third in league.

PREMIUM

Mohun Bagan and East Bengal, the two teams without which any football league in India doesn’t have legs to stand on, now have the same number of ISL titles: zero. But while SC East Bengal’s problems with investors set them back severely in 2021, their rivals from across a street on the Kolkata Maidan went on a buying spree. Amrinder Singh and Hugo Boumous joined on five-year deals; Ashutosh Mehta for three seasons and Liston Colaco has a contract that can keep him at the club till 2023. For Colaco, ATKMB were rumoured to have paid Hyderabad FC (HFC) an Indian record of ₹1 crore as transfer fee. ATKMB’s first foreign signing was also the biggest of the league—Joni Kauko chose maroon and green as his club colours, three days after the Finn had finished in the European championships.

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“You look at their bench: Ashutosh, Prabir (Das), Kiyan (Nassiri), Boumous, (Carl) McHugh, Manvir…only with individual abilities they can decide games,” Hyderabad FC (HFC) coach Manuel Marquez had said before the second-leg of the semi-final on Wednesday. But the Spaniard also said, “a two-goal advantage (HFC won the first leg 3-1) is very good in one game like this.” And so it proved. It was one-way traffic: ATKMB had eight shots on target, seven off target (HFC had two and four respectively), 13 corners (HFC had two) and Das’ 12 crosses was one more than HFC could manage.

Like India had in the 2019 Asian Cup game against Bahrain, HFC had got into a defensive shell. The young players got nervous, said Marquez. “If we play this way, we will definitely lose to Kerala.” But while they live to fight on Sunday, ATKMB return empty-handed from ISL— during which they had to pay FC Goa to get coach Juan Ferrando—in a season where they had been embarrassed by FC Nasaf; the Uzbek team scoring half-a-dozen to none in the AFC Cup inter-zonal semi-finals.

ISL semi-finals are like cup ties, Jamshedpur FC coach Owen Coyle has said, meaning anything can happen. He knows. In 2020 Coyle’s Chennaiyin FC had stunned a rampaging FC Goa in a second-half blitz that virtually ensured their passage to the final. ATKMB’s 1-3 loss in the first leg of the semi-final wasn’t expected but in the defeat lay reasons for a season where they flourished and faltered in equal measure.

Set-piece problem

Two of HFC’s three goals on March 11 came from corner-kicks; ATKMB guilty of ball watching and leaving players free. Ferrando put it down to end-season fatigue and living in a bio-bubble. Your quality of life has a positive correlation with what you do on the pitch and at this point, he said before Wednesday’s match. He also said he preferred zonal marking at corner-kicks because to “control the ball, you need to control the zone.”

Among the semi-finalists, ATKMB had the worst record in defending set-pieces. They conceded 14 goals from restart moves, the third highest behind Odisha FC (19) and FC Goa (16), according to data provided by ISL. HFC and Kerala Blasters both let in 12, Jamshedpur FC nine. ATKMB also had the worst defensive record among the top four, conceding 26 goals.

“You live and die in the boxes,” said Coyle. “We work very hard on it in the training ground. It’s about repetition and everybody knowing their job. We defend both zonally and man-marking, we split that. The skipper (defender Peter Hartley) has a big responsibility in organising so we like to ensure that the boys are vocal but equally focused on the job.”

Colaco’s spectacular goals from free-kicks notwithstanding, converting set-pieces too has been poor with 21 of the 25 goals under Ferrando coming from open play.

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Business in January window

Pradhyum Reddy made this point on Wednesday. With all their resources, did ATKMB do good business in January, the pundit asked. They got Sandesh Jhingan back and signed goalie Subrata Paul as back-up to Singh. Jhingan was laid low by injury in Croatia and, as a consequence, severely short of game time. He was eased into games but is far from being the leader at the back that India head coach Igor Stimac says he is. Paul was a desperate measure and proof of not having a good back-up goalie. Contrast this with HFC getting Khassa Camarra; Jamshedpur FC signing Daniel Chima Chukwu and FC Goa Anwar Ali.

Lack of balance

It meant ATKMB couldn’t do anything to rectify the lack of balance in the squad. There wasn’t a good back-up to Singh whose form was often iffy and becaus Jhingan was rusty it left Tiri having a lot to do which the Spaniard did, playing some of his best football in seven seasons in ISL. Central defender Sumit Rathi got only 61 minutes in one game meaning that lack of game time has left him a shadow of the player who won the 2019-20 Emerging Player of the Year award.

Their biggest problem was in central midfield where no Indian was consistent. Lenny Rodrigues and Deepak Tangri were used but neither matched Jamshedpur FC’s Pronay Halder, who was released by ATKMB, Kerala Blasters’ Jeakson Singh or Puitea (Lalthathanga Khawlring) or HFC’s Souvik Chakraborty. It is not known why ATKMB did not try to buy or loan Indian midfielders in January.

That meant McHugh was needed to stabilise the midfield which in turn reduced the number of foreigners available in front because only four were allowed on the pitch this term.

Two of the same

Boumous and Kauko like to play as No. 10 and to keep both high-profile signings on the pitch, one had to play out of his preferred position. Also, to use both, either McHugh or Tiri had to be sacrificed. Maybe that could have been avoided if the team had a sporting director. HFC, Kerala Blasters, FC Goa and Mumbai City FC do. Two of them are in the final, FC Goa have been ISL’s most consistent team across seasons and Mumbai are the defending champions.

What you do in the beginning of the season influences the way you end it. ATKMB did pre-seasons, played the AFC Cup group stage in August, qualified for the inter-zonal semi-final and then gave the players leave instead of playing the Durand Cup which is being slotted as a pre-season competition. It led to the unusual situation of two pre-seasons in a season and the team looking lost against FC Nasaf in September.

Lots of positives

This emergence of Nassiri who has shown speed, intelligence and defensive discipline along with the knack of being in the right place at the right time in the opposition penalty area is a big plus. Manvir Singh showed good work ethic again even though he was mostly used as wide midfielder even wing back instead of his preferred position as striker, Colaco (8 goals and four assist) was superb, Subhasish Bose consistent and after missing a string of games early in the year due to injury, Roy Krishna is again looking sharp. The team has also got used to Ferrando’s possession heavy style and was unbeaten for 15 games before losing to Jamshedpur FC and then the first leg of the semi-final. All this should augur well for next month’s AFC Cup qualifiers. And is proof that a major overhaul is not needed ahead of ISL9.

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