look news india
New Delhi, 21 February (HS). Owen Coyle is one of the most recognizable faces in Indian football. Currently he is the head coach of Chennaiyin FC. He made his Indian Super League (ISL) debut when he took over the reins of Marina Machans midway through the season, despite leading them from the bottom half of the table to the final in the 2019–20 season. An interesting fact from that season is that they had a 1–0 win in their away match against Mumbai City FC on 21 February 2020.
On February 23, Marina Machans will again face Mumbai City FC and this match will be played at their home ground. They will once again hope to make it to the playoffs from an uncertain situation. In such a situation, it is expected that Coyle will again work his magic for Marina Machans, who is in ninth place with 15 points in 14 matches.
“Chennaiy FC was a successful team in its early years, winning trophies,” Coyle said in an official statement issued by the league on Tuesday. Obviously, in the last five seasons, Chennaiyin FC reached the playoffs only when I and my assistant coach took charge and took them from the bottom to the finals. “This shows that we have a lot of work ahead of us and we need to keep Chennaiyin FC competitive for trophies and try to take them back to their glory days.”
Coyle said, “We have shown with Jamshedpur FC that you can become champion even without big star players. “It gives everyone in the league confidence that you can do it.”
Currently, Chennaiyin FC has many potential players, which include Farooq Choudhary, Ayush Adhikari, Ankit Mukherjee, Vinci Barreto, Ninthoinganba Meitei and Rahim Ali etc.
Coyle admitted that he has done wonders with new young players at his previous clubs, including the duo of Boris Singh (now with FC Goa) and Ritwik Das who played a key role in Jamshedpur FC's title win. Similarly, the tactician was one of the people in the country who brought out the talents of Lallianzuala Chhangte when the winger played a key role in Chennaiyin FC finishing as runners-up in ISL 2019-20 by scoring seven goals.
“I am a coach who, during my stint at Jamshedpur FC, included boys who did not get to play matches,” Coyle said – youngster Boris Singh had gone to the then ATK Mohun Bagan, but he was given a Didn't get to play the match because they already had better players. But these youth need a chance. Ritwik Das is also one such player, who is now in the national team and is doing better. He didn't get match time at Kerala Blasters FC and I brought him there because I saw him perform well for Real Kashmir FC because he was my kind of player.”
He further said, “Chhangte's example is in front, when I went to Chennaiyin FC in season six, people told me that he is a great player, but he is not able to score goals. But Chhangte did the same for me in the sixth season as he is doing now for Mumbai City FC. “He scored a lot of goals and provided assists in the second half of the season.”
The Scottish tactician praised the ISL ecosystem for giving birth to such stories, saying, “There are many such stories in Indian football that came to the fore and rose to fame because of the ISL. Clubs have become more professional, organized and have stronger structures, which will lead to the growth of Indian football. ISL deserves a lot of credit for this.”
