ISL: Chennaiyin bank on 'pumped up' strikers ahead of tie against Mumbai City FC

Chennai: After a humbling 4-1 defeat away to Delhi Dynamos FC, Chennaiyin FC are determined to bounce back at home against a struggling Mumbai City FC team. The star for Chennai to this point has been Brazilian Elano Blumer, who has scored in all three games. The former Manchester City player has been deadly from free kicks in particular and has accounted for three of his side’s five goals. But assistant Chennai coach Vivek Nagul insisted Chennai was not a one man team. “We are really confident about Elano’s ability and want to utilize him but we are not dependent on one player,” Chennaiyin assistant coach Vivek Nagul said at the pre-match press conference. “We have a good of players, good strikers and midfielders who can score goals. [caption id=“attachment_1775237” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Nicolas Anelka trains for Mumbai City FC.[/caption] “You will see a change in the attitude of our strikers. Now they are pumped up to perform well in the next matches.” The visitors are without the injured Freddie Ljungberg, but their captain Syed Nabi returns after missing the last two games. Bigger news still is a potential league debut for former French striker Nicolas Anelka, completing his ban for making the controversial quenelle gesture while playing for West Bromwich Albion in the Premier League last season. Asked whether Chennaiyin had prepared any differently in order to counter the threat of Anelka, Nagul said it had been business as usual in training. “We have no special strategy for Anelka. We are very confident of our defense. As I said, our defensive midfielders have done a good job. We just have to see that we keep possession and make sure Anelka does not score goals when he has possession. The team did not practice at the Jawaharlal Nehru stadium, where the match will be played, but at a local school ground because of the threat of rain. What they worked on was better defending from set pieces, Nagul said. “We went back to the drawing board and we talked about it and we have worked on it. Hopefully we will not concede goals from set pieces in the next game.” The biggest concern is the fitness of the players. This will be Chennaiyin’s third match in six days and the team plans to rotate the players so they don’t burn out. “It is more about rolling the substitutions to keep the players fresh and resting the players who are tired,” Nagul said. “We will be doing that in these few games.” Team captain Bojan Djordic has also struggled to play a first 90 minutes and his lack of fitness has forced Chennaiyin to depend on their bench to fill their midfield. “To be frank, Bojan in the match [against Delhi] , he struggled and we had to take him off. We don’t want to force any player unnecessarily. We are trying to do some better changes until Bojan can get fit.” Midfielder Harmanjot Khabra said the players had to do whatever it took to get on the field. As a professional, it depends on the player,” he said. “He has to always be ready for the next game. ISL schedule is very tight and it is the player’s own responsibility to be fit for the next match.”