TEAM ANALYSIS: Chennai mantra is to go on playing aggressively, but plug leaky defence

IF CHENNAIYIN FC FEEL ROBBED out of their title in the inaugural ISL, it's sort of justified. They finished at the top of the table after regular season. They had the most dynamic forward line that scored the most number of goals in the tournament. Their brand of football, too, was much more open and aggressive than most of their opponents and they were attractive to watch. Things sort of fell apart for them in the first leg of the semi-finals away at Kerala, but other than that they arguably had the best season of all ISL franchises. 

What brought them down was their defence. They let in the second highest number of goals in the regular season. And on that fateful night in Kochi, it was those same defensive flaws that proved to be their undoing. They led a fierce comeback in the return leg, but things fell apart as a late goal allowed Kerala Blasters to progress to the final.

So under normal circumstances what Chennaiyin FC manager Marco Materazzi should have been doing is locking down most of their attacking players and boosting the hell out of their defence. But that is not how ISL works. Unlike a football league which allows clubs to keep the players they want long term, ISL forces its franchises to release most of its players. The Chennaiyin FC management went about the retention situation well, holding onto successful players from every department like Balwant Singh, Jayesh Rane, Dhanachandra Singh, Bernard Mendy, and marquee player Elano etc. They have retained a total of 8 players, the highest in ISL. They added to the tally when they let Mohun Bagan keeper Shilton Paul, who played for them last season, go unsold in the Draft, and then signing him later for a fraction of his asking price. They also re-signed the Colombian striker Stiven Mendoza from the open market, making the total number of retained players go up to 10.

Most of the strengthening of domestic players in the contingent took place in the Auction and the Draft. From the auction they won Thoi Singh and goalie Karanjit Singh. From the Draft they called out the likes of Dhanpal Ganesh, Zakeer Mundampara and Lalhmangaihsanga. The result was a much more refined line-up of home-grown talent. 

The foreign players' recruitment has been a bit more diverse. They have poached goalie Apoula Edel and striker Fikru Teferra from the Atletico de Kolkata camp. But while Edel is a decent signing, and can be seen as a final step to address the leaky defence problem they had last season, Fikru Teferra, while an effective striker in the first season and a crowd puller, did not inspire with his disciplinary record. ATK dropped him for good reason, and signing him is always going to be a gamble. 

After retaining both their Brazilians from last year, they have added some talented individuals to that lot. Raphael Augusto, a 24 year old medio, has come on loan as a developmental project from Fluminese. Defender Mailson Alves, too, is rather young than last year's lot at 27. Eder, 32, is a seasoned, reliable option at centre back. Then there's the veteran Italian duo of medio Manuele Blasi and defender Alessandro Potenza. A team composition like this brings diversity of age and playing style to every department for Chennaiyin.

The team spent a few weeks in Italy, camping and training as part of their pre-season efforts. During this time, they played a few friendly matches, mostly with Serie D clubs. The results were mixed and didn't reveal much in terms of how they were coming together as a team, although facing opponents that gave them some trouble, presumably, helped them come together as a unit. 

Now that they are back, their fans will expect a repeat of the form they held for most of the inaugural ISL. They will expect the same bravado in their gameplay, the openness and willingness to take risks by pushing more men ahead. And since so many of their players as well as the manager have been retained, this Chennaiyin side has, at least on paper, enough firepower to deliver on that. But after losing out on the maiden ISL title by one night of blunder,  Materazzi might want to proceed with caution, and pay extra attention to defence. The trick will be to do this without taking away from the ebullience of the attack.