Mumbai City FC’s head coach Des Buckingham, despite the commanding win over ATK Mohun Bagan on Wednesday in the Hero Indian Super League (ISL) at Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium, wants his side to keep improving.

The defending champions bounced back after facing a defeat against Hyderabad FC, losing 1-3. Buckingham felt that the side converted key moments in the match into goal-scoring opportunities that proved to be the difference.

Buckingham addressed the media at the end of the game and here are the excerpts from his press conference.

On the back of the result last time around, did you ask the players for a reaction, if so, what exactly did you ask?

No, it wasn’t so much of a reaction. I said I wanted us to continue getting better. In the first game, we played very well and got the score that we deserved. In the second game, I thought we played wel as well but we didn’t take our chances in those key moments. So, for tonight, for me it was about getting better and that’s what we have wanted to do every game. We took our chances in key moments and I felt we stood to show glimpses of our plans on a more consistent basis.

What was the reason for giving Vikram (Singh) a start today and that paid off very well, will we see more of him in the coming few games?

Yeah, it is not just Vikram. We’ve got a lot of young football players at this club and we would like the best Indian players at this football club because we want to develop them and then move on and progress their careers. But when they are here it is important that they understand the system we want to play in and how they work within it. That’s what Vikram has done. But it is not just Vikram, young Gurkirat (Singh) made his debut tonight. They have deserved the opportunity because of how hard they have worked in the off-season and how they have adapted to what we want.

We saw a goalfest last night as well, was it something you drew inspiration from when you were at 3-nil in the half-time as well?

No, not so much inspiration. We wanted to play well. It is very important for us to concentrate on how we play and what we do with the ball and without the ball. The message in the half-time was to continue to focus on what we were doing, regardless of the situation. At half-time it was important that we managed the second half and the way we wanted.

What steps did you take to improve on the previous defeat and did the tactics work tonight?

We only had three days since the last game so we have done a lot of work on the field in the last two days, especially tactically, and the players have really taken a shine to it. They are very open to the ideas we have to suggest and not only that but to implement on the pitch and that is a joy to watch for any coach.

You had a victory today and the loss in the last match while ATK Mohun Bagan won their previous two, the league is equally balanced and anybody can beat anybody on a given day?

I don’t know about anyone else, I said even after the second game, we don’t get carried away with the result. We won the first one and we didn’t get carried away and we lost the second. We won’t get carried away with this result, we’ll just continue to monitor the results in the other games but we will focus on how we want to do, what we want to do and we have a game again in three days time so we will be focused on that now.