With Mumbai City kicking-off their 2018-19 Hero Indian Super League (ISL) campaign on October 2, all eyes will be set on the new manager and the variety of players that have been brought in over the summer transfer window to bolster the team’s chances.

At the Hero ISL Media Day held in Mumbai on Monday, goalkeeper Amrinder Singh and defender Lucian Goian spoke exclusively to indiansuperleague.com on the team’s new head coach and the strength of the squad heading into the tournament.

Positives of an experienced coach

Amrinder, who has established himself as one of the finest shot stoppers in the league, spoke of the new faces in the team including head coach Jorge Costa. “It’s always a difficult process when a new coach comes in. The team is new, there are new players and every season is a little difficult for every team. So, for us the positive thing right now is we have a coach who has played on a top level and he knows how to handle the players. Another positive thing is, he has made sure that the team is not just a team but a big happy family and because of that we have a lot of confidence to go out and play well.”

Targets for the season

Last season, Amrinder had a stellar campaign, amassing the maximum number of saves by any keeper in the league. This season however, the 25-year-old has firmly set his sights on a top-four finish with the Islanders. “I was very happy with my performance last season. Sadly, we couldn’t reach top four. So, this season our major focus is to reach the top four and my personal objective is that we reach the top four and then decide how to approach the latter stages. My focus is not on how many clean sheets I have and how many saves I do. I’ll be very happy if I don’t have to make any saves the entire tournament. I’ll be very happy with that. Zero clean sheets, I’ll be fine with that, but my focus is that we reach the top four and we end up at the top of the table. I’ll be very happy with that.”

Lucian putting in the hard yards

Team-mate Lucian Goian was the team’s pillar of support in defence last year. The Romanian spoke on Costa’s appointment as well as the team’s pre-season trip to Thailand. “We are a new team and we are really confident. We are training really good in this period. In Thailand, we had a successful period and we are training hard. We are starting to understand what the coach wants and his style of play. It’s very important when the season starts to apply what we did in training and I’m sure we’ll do the best.”