ISL 20/21: Kerala Blasters vs ATK Mohun Bagan

Finally, we are off and running into the seventh season of the Hero Indian Super League. Five months of non-stop football is a treat for everyone who loves Indian football. The opening match was played between the same teams as last year, Kerala Blasters vs ATK Mohun Bagan.

The Tuskers parted ways with Eelco Schattorie to bring in the Spanish coach Kibu Vicuña who won the I-League last year with Mohun Bagan. They had a good pre-season where they won two, drew one and lost one out of the four matches. They also kept clean sheets in three of those four games.

On the other side, we have champions of both the leagues ATK (ISL) and Mohun Bagan (I-League) coming together to form one entity ATK Mohun Bagan. Antonio López Habas will continue his impressive stint with the formerly merged side. ATK Mohun Bagan is the only team who didnt play any preseason friendly and yet they came out as the winners of this fixture.

In this tactical analysis, we will examine the tactics of both the teams. The following analysis will decipher the match events to correlate to it the eventual result.

Line-ups

Kerala Blasters started in a 4-2-3-1 with Albino Gomes in goal. The new signings Bakary Koné and Costa Nhamoinesu formed the centre-back pair and were supported by Jessel Carneiro and Prasanth Karuthadathkuni in the backline. Former La Liga midfielder Vicente Gómez and Sergio Cidoncha formed the double pivots. Ritwik Das made his ISL debut on the left-wing and Nondamba Naorem played on the opposite flank. Gary Hooper played upfront and Sahal Samad played behind him.

ATK Mohun Bagan played in their preferred 5-3-2 formation. Arindam Bhattacharya took charge between the sticks in behind the Pritam Kotal and new signings Tiri and Sandesh Jhinghan. Prabir Das and Michael Soosairaj played as wing-backs. Pronay Halder, Carl McHugh and ex-Real Madrid youth academy player Javi Hernández formed the midfield three. Roy Krishna and Edu García were paired as attackers.