'I'm Not Very Optimistic About The ISL'

'Indian football needs to work together and move in the same direction.'
'Only then will the competition in India improve, and the Indian national team will improve.'

Manolo Marquez is an observant man. The FC Goa coach has got his eyes firmly trained on his target, the elusive Indian Super League title, but is aware of the challenges he will need to face and fight along the way.

FC Goa's failure to win the ISL has left fans frustrated. But Marquez, who tasted ISL success with Hyderabad FC in 2022, has optimism, that soothing balm for fans.

"It's true that last season was a good one but finally during a season there are good and bad moments and we had some bad games just in the beginning of the 2nd leg and this didn't allow us to win the shield. But this proves that last season the team performed well," Marquez said in a press conference on FC Goa's media day on Friday.

"Then if you speak of the semi-final against Mumbai City FC sometimes accidents happen in football. It's not very common that you are up 1 or 2-0 and concede three goals in injury time. But the season was good. We are ambitious and we will try to win the title this time," added, Marquez, who took Hyderabad FC to their maiden ISL title in 2021-22 season.

This season, FC Goa has a major shift in the squad. Undeterred with 13 players leaving, including their top scorer last season Brandon Fernandes who moved to Mumbai City FC, they brought in 12 players, including the returning goalkeeper Laxmikant Kattimani (a fan favourite) and midfielder Sahil Tavora. This situation may sound alarmist but Marquez provides a grim reason for lack of club loyalty from players.

"In this modern football, changing 12-13 players is common. The problem is the agents, they are killing football, this is the problem," the man from Catalonia shot straight.

Talking about the addition of two more teams to the ISL this season (Punjab FC and Mohammedan Sporting), coach Marquez deemed it an important move.

"We need more teams, more than 13. We need good competition, at least 16-18 teams, but let's see... I know it's difficult. A competition without relegation is difficult. In season 1, there were 8 teams and now 13 teams but India needs more teams in ISL."

"in India, they play Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday... The main thing is to have a fixture good for the ISL and good for the national team too," Manolo Marquez, who was named coach of the senior Indian men's national football team, tells Rediff.com's Norma Astrid Godinho.

You have a long list of injuries in FC Goa. How are your players coming along and are they fit to start?

Oh, we have now four players, including Alan (Saji, striker) who was injured in the last game in the Bandodkar Trophy (pre-season tournament). The other three players, they were with different teams even Sandesh (Jhingan) was with the national team in January.

We are expecting Iker Guarrotxena and Sandesh to come back very soon. Mohammad Yasir (midfielder) will be out till next month, Lara (Sharma, goalkeeper) will arrive in November-December and Alan practically won't play the whole season because he was injured about a week ago.

Injuries are the worst part in football, whether you win or lose. Today Alan was there at our training session and I was very sad because he was watching his team-mates train and he was outside waiting for his surgery. Even if it happens to an opponent, it not something I like to see, I feel very bad.

You spoke about agents killing football. Could you elaborate?

At the press conference someone mentioned that 13 players have left and 12 have come during the summer transfers this season at FC Goa. If you check all the teams, all of them also have big chunks of players going in and out in the transfer window. This didn't happen in the past.

Not only the agents, the main problem is the player.

Finally, every time it's a like a big ball that maybe India, in not too many years, will have problems if they don't change this situation, because every time the players have higher salaries.

ISL teams are not clubs, they have owners. When the owners say stop, let's see what happens. I'm very optimistic about this season of FC Goa, but I'm not very optimistic about the continuity of the ISL.

This is my feeling that changing 14-15 players is not a problem of the players or the coach, but it is the problem in the system. We can speak 1,000 hours about it.

For example, in my country Spain, they play on the weekends and then they stop because there is a FIFA window. And then from Monday to Friday they train with the national team.

Then they play Saturday and Tuesday or Sunday and Wednesday and then they come back for the clubs two weeks later.

Here in India, they play Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday. The players arrive at the national team... one player played yesterday, another played five days ago.

Now it goes like this: Bengaluru players arrive four days later, then Mohun Bagan players arrive, one day later players from Goa, Odisha, Chennai.

So it's difficult to manage this situation. The main thing is to have a fixture good for the ISL and good for the national team too.

It's my fifth season here and except the first two seasons that were held during COVID, the other three seasons, every year they (te ISL) say they we will play from Friday to Sunday, every year.

But every year the games are played every day. Finally again, you cannot train for one player who arrived yesterday and one who played four-five days ago.

The problem is whatever I say, people think these are excuses, No. These are realities. I can say we didn't win, I'm the first person responsible. This is how it works in football. But these are the realities.

Everything is about rankings and statistics, I understand about the rankings, but I'm not focussed about rankings or statistics. Say in one game maybe one player makes 10 good passes, but I want one risky pass... it's not just about one person.

Now I am the national team coach and FC Goa coach and I can speak with them (the AIFF), but some day, I don't know maybe now, maybe in the future with the next international head coach, they (the AIFF) will have to sit down together and say 'Ok, let's do the fixture in a correct way which will be good for the ISL and for the national team.'

We can speak for hours, we can speak about what I feel and that is Indian players need to go abroad, but that is a chain reaction. Why don't they go abroad? Because they live very comfortably here.

This scheduling is clearly affecting Indian football, shouldn't FIFA intervene and tell ISL or AIFF to mend its ways?

The problem with FIFA and the difference with India... I love India, it's my fifth season here.. but one word that may be good for India is scouts.

We know exactly the FIFA competitions for 2025, 2026 and 2027. Here in India, you decide the fixture maybe two weeks before the competition, maybe 10 days... Then in one moment we change the schedule of this game and then another... and then it's difficult to work.

Finally, it's not about FIFA, in this case it's about India. Indian football needs to work together and move in the same direction. Only then will the competition in India improve, and the Indian national team will improve.

Would you say this ISL season is like the initial one considering a lot of players have moved in and out of clubs and teams will have to adopt a different game plan this season?

My experience in India with Hyderabad FC is that with continuity you have more options to get good results.

If you ask me, this season maybe Odisha have continuity with a very good coach (Sergio Lobera). Odisha was good last season and they'll be very good again this season.

One team has to win and if every team changes 13 or 14 players and the team that wins the tournament will say it was very good to change all these players. But I think continuity is one factor and clubs they don't think too much.

When we were champions with Hyderabad, all the foreigners we had signed that season were those who had already played before in the ISL except Javi Siverio. All others like Edu Garcia, Bartholomew Ogbeche, Juanan, they played before. We also kept Joel Chianese and Joao Victor. Plus the continuity of Indian players.

We had a very strong team. We didn't also have a very big budget. This is why I tell you that if there is continuity in the clubs maybe there won't be more cases like this.

You are now coach of India and FC Goa. Are you confident that when you're handling the India assignment, FC Goa will be in top form?

Yes, I am very confident.

I tell you now that Gourmangi Singh (former India captain and FC Goa's assistant coach) will be one of the best Indian coaches in not too many years.

He knows how to speak, he knows how to manage the group, he knows when he has to be behind the scenes and this is very important in a person working in a staff.

Now I was with the national team (at the Intercontinental Cup played last week) he was managing FC Goa and he took the team to the final and helped us win the pre-season tournament. It's true that we were speaking daily, but you could see how the players performed with him.

It's not the first time or the last that one coach has held two jobs. And I can promise you we will work very hard in India as well as FC Goa.