Mohun Bagan's performances in the recent past do not demean the stature of the club: Subrata

Technical Director Subrata Bhattacharya met press today after practice session in the morning. His thinking was also on the same line that of Barreto as he also stressed in bringing back the confidence of the players. One of his main objective, he said, is to organize the defence properly because according to him defence will have to be strong and not let in easy goals. He also said that his forward line is capable enough to score in every match.

When asked about McDowell Mohun Bagan's not so good start in I-League in the last few seasons, he said, "Performance in last few seasons does not reflect the stature of Mohun Bagan - The National Club of India, which is 120 years old." He blasted at one reporter saying that McDowell Mohun Bagan had in the past started the season with landslide wins of 7-8 goals.

Subrata said that he will ask his players to concentrate on one match at a time. At present, the target is to win the first match to make a good start.

Regarding supporters' emotions, he said, "Supporters will be emotional. I can tell you all, I also shouted from gallery as a supporter when Mohun Bagan did not play well in my childhood. We will have to understand the sentiment of the fans. The supporters will throw stones and abuse players in case of negative result. I am used to all this since 1976."

When asked how will the 5 ex-players manage the team together, Subrata was at his best sense of humour as he said, "This is not Writer's Building and there is no separate Department for separate people. We will collectively run the show."

Subrata felt that there is not much difference between the teams in I-League and McDowell Mohun Bagan definitely has a good chance of winning the title.

In the evening, Subrata was at his brilliant best at today's "7 P.M." live program on a vernacular channel.

He drew examples of his playing career where McDowell Mohun Bagan went trophy-less for a long time. He recalled how with one of the weakest teams (1974) Mohun Bagan beat East Bengal in the semi-final and overcame a spirited and a very strong JCT (Inder Singh, Manjit Singh & Harjinder Singh were only three of the stalwarts of the star-studded JCT side) 3-2 in the final to lift the Durand Cup.

He recalled how McDowell Mohun Bagan came back very strongly in 2000-01 (with a 7-point deficit) and the National League had a literal photo-finish when the Mariners pipped ITI 1-0 in their last match and East Bengal also manged to edge out SBT by the same margin and finished 1 point ahead of McDowell Mohun Bagan. He, however, did not hesitate to mention that the East Bengal match was "suspicious to say the least" as SBT was not willing to play that match because of heavy underfoot conditions, and it was their home match!!

Babluda failed to "remember" of any incident between him and Prasanta Banerjee that has kept everyone "guessing". He blamed it on a section of the Press. In fact, he took great pride in mentioning that Prasanta put up one of his best performances (if not the best) when Babluda was the coach-cum-player in 1987. After 3 consecutive defeats against EB, Mohun Bagan came back very strongly and defeated East Bengal in the 4th encounter which Subrata did not hesitate to call "Prasanta's" match. Prasanta, the kind of ball player he was, was never known for snatches, tackles and defensive roles
.......but in that match Prasanta was all over the ground going in hard tackles and snatches besides being in his usual role as a game-maker.

Babluda sounded very confident when the present McDowell Mohun Bagan team was discussed. He clearly said he would discuss with the officials in a couple of days regarding Simon Storey (who has developed rib fracture few days back), the only hitch was that only an Asian can replace him. However, he was not worried at all. He was confident about Kingshuk, he was also very hopeful about Anwar & Surkumar. Overall, he was happy with the physique of the defenders. He would ensure Odafa play in the danger zone and not fall back. He said he would also take a close look at Hudson Lima. Subrata was confident of Barreto becoming fully fit within Saturday. He also said that he would make calculative moves and step accordingly so that McDowell Mohun Bagan win their first 5-6 matches. He has coined a slogan for the players which he refused to divulge though. On the whole it was the aggressive, vocal yet evergreen Subrata, the way Subrata is known to millions of McDowell Mohun Bagan fans.........should we say that McDowell Mohun Bagan is "back to the future"!!!....Again.....

REPORT: Shiladitya Mitra, Abhijit Mitra and Goutam Dass