ISL 2021-22: Disappointed to be out of the competition – Jamshedpur FC’s Owen Coyle

Jamshedpur FC head coach Owen Coyle was disappointed to be knocked out of the ongoing Hero Indian Super League after they lost the semifinal by 2-1 (aggregate) against Kerala Blasters on Tuesday. Jamshedpur FC had clinched the Winners League Shield trophy after winning 13 matches in the league stage and finished at the top of the standings with 43 points.

But, they were not able to come up with a complete performance against the Southerners in both legs of the semifinal. Kerala Blasters FC had taken an early advantage as Sahal Samad had scored in the first leg.

Adrian Luna gave a 2-0 lead to the Southerners in the second leg as he scored in the 18th minute on Tuesday. Pronay Halder scored in the 50th minute of the game for Jamshedpur FC but the Yellow Army were able to keep their lead till the end.

Jamshedpur FC had 53% of possession and they took six shots on target but still ended on the wrong side of the result.

Owen Coyle said in the post-match press conference, “In tonight’s game, we certainly failed to manage to get into extra time. Anyways we felt we did enough to win the game. Although Kerala Blasters FC had some good chances on the counter-attack, which was always going to happen because we have committed so many players forward. And then even going to go behind 2-0 many teams would have felt sorry for themselves. But we picked ourselves and we kept going. Obviously, there are a few very close things in the second half to get that done to go 2-1 in front. Obviously disappointed to be out of the competition. That being said we had an amazing season, surely the best team in the country over 20 games. But I want to say good luck to Kerala Blasters FC. They’re a good team, good players. So we give credit where credit’s due. Whoever they play in the final, it’s going to be a terrific game.”

Speaking on retaining the current players in the team for the next season, the Briton added, “That’s the nature of football, some people come, some people go but I’m sure when I’m recruiting, I can get good players. I can go and get players that want to play for me. That’s not a conversation for today. I’ve got a lot of stuff myself to be thinking over as I said before, I’ve been away from my family a long time everything else. So we’ll take one disappointment and then as always, we move on from there.”

Reflecting on the team’s future plans, the 55-year old said, “Well, I’ll sit down with the management as we did last year. The club had been fantastic, months ago they said to me that I’m staying on. That for me shows the quality of people we have at the football club.”