ISL: There is no reason to talk about Sunil too much, says BFC head coach Marco Pezzaiuoli

Bengaluru FC's miserable form continues as 10-men FC Goa snatched away the victory from the Blues. They are currently sitting in the 10th position just over SC East Bengal in the ISL point table. Pezzaiuoli, however, is still focused on the positives of their encounter against the Gaurs.

Lost to a 10 man FC Goa

FC Goa had the odds stacked up against them when Ortiz, their main man in front was sent off due to his rash behaviour after Suresh tackled him in the 55th minute. Bengaluru started the second half strongly and the sent off was a boon for the blues but they failed to capitalize on their one-man advantage and to make things worse, they even conceded a goal. At the 84th minute, the numbers became even when Suresh received a second yellow card. When asked about the missed chance of winning this match, the coach said,

"First of all our first half comeback was good. After 1-0, it was a very tough game. We came back to 1-1 from a free-kick but in the second half, we lost a bit of mind after gaining a one-man advantage. We didn't keep possession. We invest a lot in the attack after halftime. I think it was a good game. We had created chances, but in the last 5-6 minutes we stopped completely, we can't afford that."

The defence has been poor

Bengaluru has failed to keep a clean sheet in this season so far and their defence has looked shaky time and time again, when asked if the root of this long-lasting defensive problem is simply "lack of quality" on the squad, the coach defended his players and said,

"Farooq is coming out of injury, Sadak is not here we bought him as a central defender but he had some family issues, King is out. We are missing some key players and maybe that is why everything isn't 100 percent on the defence right now but again we can talk about defending a set-piece and we defend those as a team. Only defence wise I think the opponent didn't have many chances and don't talk about Bengaluru's defence being poor, it is more difficult to defend a high pressing team but still Goa probably only had 3 chances. You can say we defended set-pieces poorly because that has happened before today but again, that is teamwork."

How difficult would it be to go to the top 4

Bengaluru is sitting at the 10th position right now, with each passing game their chances of qualification are becoming dim, but the coach is still positive about his team's gradual improvement over this dismal season and he is looking forward to the challenge his team will have to face to qualify.

"I think I look forward to the next games. As I have said before, the team was trying to win the game for 96 minutes. We have a lot of energy in this team; we have made some small progress. We have made stupid mistakes today when it was 11 against 10. But I still believe how we played and how we tried to win the game had some positive intent, it was a step higher. We had a lot of chances that we didn't have before. I see that step by step we are getting better. It is a new team with new players, but things like losing while having a man advantage cannot happen. The experienced players need to serve the team better"

Sunil Chhetri's form

Sunil Chhetri's ISL campaign so far has been forgettable, the Indian Skipper has failed to score a goal for five games now and the draught of goals stings even more cause he had some golden opportunities in this match as well. When asked about his reaction to this unfortunate form of their main man, the gaffer said,

"He is a human being, after all, sometimes you don't have good luck. Today he had a great chance that he couldn't capitalize, normally he closes those chances but these happen sometimes, you have to come out and step out of it. He has the support of the team and also you saw how hard he worked for the team today, his through balls were good, he needs to get his luck back and when you work as much as he does, you get the luck sooner than later."

Looking beyond Sunil Chhetri for the team's sake

The coach came out and defended the Indian legend when he asked if someone else in front of the goal would give Bengaluru a better chance on goals. He made it clear that targeting the temporary form of one player would not be entertained on his watch,

"I think there is no reason to talk about Sunil too much. He is just one player; we can talk about Ashiq or some other players. I don't pick one player out. We lost today as one team and that is the important part."