Days after signing a two-year contract extension with Mumbai City FC, head coach Des Buckingham was greeted at last weekend’s home fixture with a banner from fans that read: “Lead us Des”.
Going into Saturday’s away game against ATK Mohun Bagan, the Englishman is doing that. He has led Mumbai City FC to an unbeaten run this Indian Super League (ISL) season that includes an ongoing eight-match win streak, a competition record. Top of the table after 13 games, Mumbai City are being chased by reigning champions Hyderabad FC but, as their 40 goals thus far reflect, carry a beat-me-if-you-can aura.
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Moving to the setup 15 months ago from another City Football Group (CFG) club (A-League’s Melbourne City), Buckingham talks about why that label influenced his decision to stay and the factors behind this run that comes on the back of an AFC Champions League where they became the first Indian team to win in the current format.
Excerpts from an interview:
What made you stay on at Mumbai City?
There were other options. But when I look at my time in the group, firstly the two-and-a-half years in Melbourne, the trust that’s been put into me and the development as a person and coach, I’ve felt that here too. This is my 21st season of coaching but I’m only 37. I’ve got a lot more years of career hopefully in front and to be able to do that in arguably the largest footballing group in the world, I feel it’s the right decision to stay. What I want to do aligns with what CFG wants to do here.
And what is that.
I was brought in for two main reasons: one, to develop young players—it’s evolved into players, young or experienced—and two, to set this club up in a very similar manner to what other CFG clubs looked like. Having spent that time in Melbourne where we won the double, we’ve brought a lot of that infrastructure to the club that is now up and running. That’s things around gym programmes, wellness, rest, recovery, etc, to give the best to our players and staff. And then, there was to bring a certain style of football and see if we could implement that with the players that were here. I’m very happy that what we’ve done in the last 15 months is starting to allow players to showcase themselves a lot better.
Going forward, it’s about making sure we be as good as we can be, and add to it. I want to be the best coach I can be. We want the best Indian players here. We want to play a certain style of football, which, I think, has been on full show this season. And we want to be, in 2-3 years’ time, a club that doesn’t just challenge for trophies for one season. It’s not just about one season and nothing again for 3-4 seasons; it’s about putting things in place that allows us long-term success. That excites me.
The team has scored 40 goals and it has got the fans to turn up at home. How important is that playing style you speak of in that?
For me it’s the most important. There are many different ways to win games of football. We’ve got a very clear way in how we want to play: an exciting, attacking brand of football. It looks simple but there’s a lot of time and work that goes behind the scenes to make it look simple.
Given the run you’re on, is there a sense of something special brewing within the group?
The feeling in the changing room is one of focus, of professionalism. It’s not one of a group getting carried away. They’re happy but we know we need to do a lot more to be successful. If we continue to push and drive each other, which I see every day in training, and hold ourselves to our standard, we’d put ourselves in the best position to get the job done.
Last season too you had a dominant start before fading. What’s different this term?
I arrived only three weeks before the season. We won the double (in the previous season they topped the league phase and won the title), but five players had left. So, there was a little bit of a rebuild to be done. We got off to a really good start, but weren’t able to sustain it. This year, it’s given us time to plan. We started last January in the type of players we wanted to bring in. We knew we were going to the Champions League and we wanted to do as well as we could with that (two wins in the group stage). We used the Durand Cup (Mumbai City reached the final) to be successful and also prepare for the ISL. All that has snowballed into where we are now—some real consistency 13 games into the ISL season.
How valuable has the addition of Greg Stewart been?
As important as any of the other players we’ve brought in. The major part has been the ability to retain the core from last year, because we spent a lot of time trying to set them up to play a certain way. And then we’ve tried to complement that with some quality additions in those final spaces. When you’re able to bring in someone like Greg or (Jorge Pereyra) Diaz or (Rostyn) Griffiths and surround them with the quality of (Ahmed) Jahouh and (Mourtada) Fall, it gives us different ways of doing things.
In the middle of this incredible run, does the thought of a loss stay on your mind?
People don’t seem to believe this, but I don’t get caught up on runs. We have a clear way of working, and that will not change whether we win, lose or draw. That’s important because it affects behaviour, and then you don’t see the highs and lows and don’t change what you do based on the outcome.
