ISL 2020-21 preview: Still searching for win, Odisha FC ready for Kerala

Kerala Blasters has posted only one win and is lying ninth among the 11 teams. The men from Kochi have struggled to score freely.

Odisha FC's miseries continued in 2021 as it lost to East Bengal on Sunday.

Odisha FC is the only team that has failed to register a win in the 2020-21 edition of the Indian Super League. It will be hungry to open the account against Kerala Blasters at the GMC Stadium in Bambolim, Goa on Thursday.

Kerala has posted only one win and is lying ninth among the 11 teams. The men from Kochi have struggled to score freely. The fact that they have scored just eight goals – only the bottom-placed Odisha has netted less – should be a worrying statistic. But coach Kibu Vicuna isn't disheartened. “The good thing is that we created chances,” he said.

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“The bad thing is that we did not score. We are working to improve in this aspect. Every game is different.”

He added he had respect for Odisha. “They did not deserve to lose the last match against East Bengal. They have good players. So we will focus on having a good game, creating chances and taking them."

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His counterpart Stuart Baxter concurred. “The biggest issue we have right now is that despite playing well in most games, we haven't been able to turn it into results,” he said. “Simply putting the ball into your net and stopping the ball from going into your opponent's net — how do we do that and how do we do that more efficiently? Despite playing reasonably well in most games, and dominating at times, those are not being translated into results. That can damage belief.”