Santosh Kashyap brings new hope

The off-season is also a challenging period for every football club. Most decisions that determine the following season's outcome, like, retaining few players and acquiring services of new ones or even retaining the coach or showing faith in a new one, are discussed and finalized during the off-season.

On the 29th of June, 2012, McDowell Mohun Bagan named Santosh Kashyap as their head coach for the forthcoming season. A decision that club general secretary Anjan Mitra termed "brave," brings about a new beginning for the Mariners.

Kashyap, who holds an AFC 'A' coaching license, takes charge of the Mariners after a reasonably good stint with Air India. This past season, a lot of young Indian players fared extremely well under his guidance. Sandesh Gadkari and Manandeep Singh, Kashyap's strikers in Air India, were among the top Indian goals scorers with seven a piece in the I-League. Kashyap's work with the young Air India squad, built on the strengths of homegrown players, has been well appreciated. Last season we saw Manish Bhargav and Deepak perform well, this season, under Kashyap, we might see a few more young Indian players taking charge.

Kashyap has a strong squad at his disposal and he will have to use it wisely. Scoring goals was not a problem last season, it was stopping them. Kashyap will have to work hard to create a defense that can hold fort over 90 minutes. At the press conference on Friday, Kashyap said he knew that McDowell Mohun Bagan was a trophy oriented club and his target was "to win all the trophies this season."

With training for the new season set to commence in less than 10 days, we hope that the I-League trophy will be at the Maidan tent soon.

McDowell Mohun Bagan and its fans extend a warm welcome to Coach Santosh Kashyap. We wish him all the success at the club.