Kerala Blasters FC head coach Mikael Stahre expressed his dissatisfaction after suffering a 1-3 defeat against Bengaluru FC in the southern rivalry fixture at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium in Kochi on Friday.

After an end-to-end engaging battle throughout the 90 minutes where both teams had numerous goalscoring opportunities, the Blasters have dropped points against the Blues due to their lack of precision in the opponent box. The Yellow Army have failed to keep a clean sheet in their last 17 ISL games, the longest such active streak by any side in the league.

It was an eventful outing in Kochi from the opening minutes as former Blasters forward Jorge Pereya Diaz opened the scoresheet by intercepting the ball from Pritam Kotal. However, the hosts found themselves back on level terms as Spanish forward Jesus Jimenez scored the equaliser from the spot kick, ending the Blues’ five-match consecutive cleansheet’s streak.

Gerard Zaragoza’s men displayed a commanding performance in the second half, where super-sub Edgar Mendez netted a brace, ensuring their first away win in the last 12 matches in the ISL. Despite the Blasters creating a couple of attacking moves with Jimenez, Kwame Peprah, and Rahul KP, they fell short of breaching the Blues’ stubborn defense line as Stahre’s men suffered their second home defeat in the 2024-25 season.

“I'm extremely disappointed. Extremely disappointed. We are playing in a full stadium. It's absolutely electric atmosphere. It's not just top-class; I think it's a world-class feeling. I think we executed the tactical plan perfectly. Sometimes, you make mistakes in a game. But this kind of huge error is not that rare,” Stahre said in the post-match press conference.

The Swedish head coach shared his displeasure with the way his team conceded goals from individual mistakes. Shedding light on how his team conceded three goals against Bengaluru FC, Stahre remarked,

“Especially the first one, then we came back. We also equalised in the dying second of the first half. It gave us some energy. We were getting closer and closer. Then we conceded that goal. We lost the energy. We tried, and we had some chances after that as well. I think the influence remained. But we created enough chances after that to equalise.”

“Then we lost the goal. Maybe too many players are high up. It was a long ball, and they scored the third one. The third one, I don't count that. The two first ones were big mistakes. But this is football,” he continued.

However, Kerala Blasters FC head coach didn’t want to blame his players for their decisive mistakes. Stahre urged his players to stand by each other and analyse the setback as a team to turn things around in their favor.

“This is really important for me as a leader, as a coach. Don't throw anyone under the bus. We are a team. Then everyone can see that. We also spoke straight after the game in the circle. We have to support each other,” he said.

“Then everyone knows that it was a mistake in the back line. It was a mistake by our goalkeeper. But when we admit that, everyone knows that. Then we go forward and support each other. I hope also that the yellow family is also supporting our players. It's easy in this situation to point fingers. You are throwing people under the bus. Hopefully, we learn from our mistakes,” he concluded.

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