Important to win home games, says Gregory

“You are expected to win your home matches. The best teams win away from home as well. If you pick up points on the road and win your home games, you will obviously be challenging for the title in any part of the world,” said the Englishman. 

When quizzed about the workload of the players who represented the national team, he added, “Unfortunately, we lost four Indian players (Jeje Lalpekhlua, Anirudh Thapa, Germanpreet Singh and Jerry Lalrinzuala) for three weeks. They got back only on Wednesday after their encounter against Myanmar. Sometimes, that has disrupted our plans during our pre-season. We will have to take a little bit more care of those guys because of their tiring schedule for the past three months but our squad is in very good shape.” Striker Jeje Lalpekhlua termed the current Chennaiyin FC squad as the “best” over the last four years. 

The manager hinted that central midfielder Germanpreet Singh might not feature in the squad for the opener. “Germanpreet has got a bit of a knock. He might not be a part of our match day squad. But, we are anticipating him to be fit for the game on Thursday (against NorthEast United FC). As a club’s coach, it’s always your worst nightmare when you lose your player during the international break,” said John Gregory. 

Commenting on the opposition, he added: ”We expect the (FC Goa) in a very Spanish way of keeping the possession and pressing for the ball in our half. We have a rough idea of who will feature for them in the starting line-up. Rather than looking at the opposition, I pay even more attention to my own boys.”