FC Pune City will have a tough job on their hands as they come up against Bengaluru FC in the third-round fixture of their Hero Indian Super League (ISL) 2018-19 campaign, which will be hosted at the Shree Shiv Chhatrapati Sports Complex in Pune on Monday. The Stallions boss Miguel Angel Portugal will be looking to get a positive result against last year’s finalist, Bengaluru, to ensure their first home match remains memorable.

Ahead of the clash, Portugal was present at the pre-match press conference to respond to questions from the media. He began by analysing his team’s performance against Mumbai City FC in their previous match which they lost 2-0, “I’m happy because the team started the match very well, but we made one mistake and Mumbai scored a goal. That is the problem for us. We had a lot of chances to score a goal and we didn’t make use of those chances and because of that, we lost the match. This is past now and we look in front, and we look forward to Bengaluru.”

Speaking on the same strain, the Spaniard further elaborated, “I think till the very last minute we played well in Mumbai. We kept up to our philosophy, we won in ball possession, we won in crossing the ball in their area, but we lost in goals. We needed to score goals because it’s impossible to win without doing that. For that, when our players had an opportunity to score a goal, we needed to score a goal. That is very important in this competition.”

The 63-year-old continued by sharing how important a win and three points would be against the Blues, “We need to win. Bengaluru is a big team, we know that. But in our first match at home, we need a win. For the first three matches, one loss, one draw and one win are normal, you know. We definitely want a win tomorrow.”

Portugal concluded by shedding some light on the importance of getting the first goal in a match. “As I said, 90% of the times, the team who scores the first goal wins. The mentality and the mood of the team who scored the first goal is good. The team who receives the goal, it’s very difficult for them to win. Normally, when you start the match you have a plan. But that plan is to not receive a goal, you have a plan to score a goal. And when you receive the goal, the plan changes. So, all the teams are normally not prepared to receive the first goal and for that, this percentage is very high.”

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