As Bengaluru FC moved to the top spot in the I-League, after their 1-0 away victory over East Bengal, manager Ashley Westwood reiterated the good work that the club from the south of the country is currently doing.
Westwood seemed very pleased with the performance of his players in the difficult away match at East Bengal, and it was a bit of a special win, as this was the first time that Bengaluru FC had won an away match against a Kolkata side.
However, the main point that Westwood seemed to have made at the post match press conference is that unlike most of the other sides in the league, Bengaluru FC actually make use of their younger players.
“We had three under-22 players in our starting XI. And two more came on in the latter stages of the game, so that makes five of thm. If you look at the other teams in the league, they take their under-22 players off after some time,” said Westwood.
According to the rules of the I-League, all teams must field at least one under-22 player in their starting XI. East Bengal manager Biswajit Bhattacharjee had in fact taken his under-22 player Samad Ali Mallick off for Rahul Bheke, on the 58th minute of the match.
This accusation also brings into light Mohun Bagan manager Sanjoy Sen’s decision to take off his under-22 player Azharuddin Mallick on the 13th minute of the Kolkata Derby against East Bengal last week, as he brought on the experienced Balwant Singh.
Westwood happy with Blues’ position
Bengaluru FC are now sitting pretty at the top of the I-League table two points ahead of defending champions Mohun Bagan. A 2-0 loss at Mumbai City in their last match seems to have indicated that the Blues might have been struggling a bit.
However, Westwood refused to accept that his side are struggling at the moment, and even went on to praise his team that has managed to string a few away wins together.
“Well, we’ve played four away games so far, and we’ve won three of them, which puts us in a pretty good position,” said Westwood.
The Englishman also revealed that he had chalked out how East Bengal would be playing. He said, “They played exactly how we expected them to.”
This seemed to resonate a bit of friction between Westwood and the East Bengal coaching staff, who kept on having a go at each other from their respective technical areas. However, this win has put Bengaluru FC in the driving seat for the I-League, as their only realistic title rivals right now seems to be Mohun Bagan.
In die grundschulzeitschrift juli 2010, s analyse zum makro- und mikrostrukturellen textwissen trkischer muttersprachlerinnen und diesen Artikel lesen muttersprachler
