Mumbai, Feb 21:
Owen Coyle has evolved to become one of the most recognisable faces in Indian football. Currently at the helm of Chennaiyin FC, he first shotinto fame after inspiring a remarkable turnaround, taking the Marina Machans from the bottom half of the table to the final of the Indian Super League (ISL) 2019-20 despite taking over the reins only midway through the campaign. An interesting turning point in that season was a 1-0 victory away against Mumbai City FC. That was February 21, 2020.
The Marina Machans will again take on Mumbai City FC on February 23, this time at home, with a hope of breaking amongst the playoffs spot from a precarious position yet again. Chennaiyin FC is particularly inan interesting position currently, and Coyle is now backing the MarinaMachans to recreate his magic.
With 15 points from 14 games, they haveendured a middling run so far. Fighting the bigwigs with his limitedresources, Coyle is helping the club get back to a place where they canbegin competing for trophies again.
“In the early years, Chennaiyin FC was really successful, with the trophiesand everything else. Obviously, in the last five seasons the only timewe reached the playoffs was when I and my assistants came in and tookthem from the bottom to the grand finale. That tells me that there’s alot of work ahead, and we need to try to take Chennaiyin FC back to theglory days of competing for trophies,” Coyle said.
“The game moves on every year. The clubs become bigger. In my home country,there are the likes of Glasgow Rangers, in Germany, there’s BayernMunich and Borussia Dortmund, then FC Barcelona in Spain,” he said.
Coyle added, “What we have shown with Jamshedpur FC, without bigger starplayers, you can still be champions. That should give everyone in theleague real belief and hope that you can do that.” Rightnow, Chennaiyin FC has a host of players with high potential at theirdisposal, such as Farukh Choudhary, Ayush Adhikari, Ankit Mukherjee,Vincy Baretto, Ninthoinganba Meetei, and Rahim Ali, amongst others.
