Phillip Brown, head coach of Hyderabad Football Club which is making its debut in the forthcoming season of Indian Super League, says the biggest challenge for him is to find a winning combination from the technique of the foreign players and the mentality of the Indian players who he felt show the kind of attitude to breach any brick wall.
In an interaction here on Wednesday, he hoped he would be successful in finding the perfect blend of these two key aspects of his team.
“Definitely, in the process, we hope to see improvement from both sides — foreign players and the Indians,” he said with a big smile.
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Brown reiterated that they are going to try and play the brand of football which should bring crowds to the stadium during the ISL.
“The preparations have been hard so far, testing for the players. We played seven friendlies, remained unbeaten though I must say, with all respect, the two teams were a bit weaker,” the Hyderabad FC coach said.
“But, again, we are not going to pay too much attention to these friendlies ahead of the League as we will be stringing together various inputs to find a winning combination,” he said.
“For me, it is important in the pre-season preparations that all the players are fit for the League. We need all the 25 players to be ready to take up the challenge at any given time in view of the demanding schedule of the league,” Brown said.
“Well, we have players like internationals Rafael Lopez Gomez Lopez and Marcelo Leite Pereira who are no strangers to ISL, and who should combine well with Gurtej Singh and Robin Singh. We are determined to play the brand of football which should be entertaining and also help the team win matches,” he said.
Reflecting on the ISL, Brown felt that the first four games are so important as they are scheduled over 11 days. “If we can get enough wins and remain unbeaten, we can look ahead of finishing at the top of the table,” he said.
“One of my biggest jobs is to see the players understand what it means to play at this level. Yes, all are hungry to showcase their skills. Right now, we have a clean slate, a blank sheet of paper. It is imperative to get off to a winning start,” the Hyderabad coach said.
On whether he feels any kind of pressure guiding the destiny of Hyderabad FC in its maiden season, a smiling Brown said he was quite used to these kind of things. “We (players and coaches) are born to to do this kind of job. We owe the tactics we employ to the management for sure. But, I enjoy it and more so in front of full stadia,” Brown said.
Significantly, Hyderabad FC has not trained at its home venue - Gachibowli Stadium in Hyderabad - which is essentially a multi-purpose venue. It is continuing its preparations in Goa.
“This could work both ways. That’s exactly the reason why we want to do well in the first few away games. We will try to exploit the pressure on home to do well in conditions familiar to them,” he said.
“We would love to step into Gachibowli Stadium for home our-leg starting November 2 in a winning frame of mind,” he said even while thanking the franchisee owners for extending complete support. “It has been fantastic at the moment and hopefully with positive results it should be even better,” signed off a smiling Brown.
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