Costa Rica World Cupper Alexandre Borges, in his first season as head coach in Indian Super League 2016, is clear in thought about planning with the players available.
Mumbai City FC is missing Udanta Singh and Fanai Lalchhuanmawai, due to injury. The former is a new signing, taken on loan from Bengaluru FC and the latter, also with BFC, has been retained by the Mumbai franchise from last season.
BFC’s advance into the AFC Cup semifinal against Malaysian club Johor Darul Tazim for a double leg fixture means two first-team players — striker Sunil Chhetri and goalkeeper Amrinder Singh — will also be released only after the AFC Cup campaign ends.
BFC’s semifinal away match is on September 28 and home game is on October 19.
Borges said, “You have to be prepared to deal with surprises, sometimes nice and other times they are not nice. We now have 20 players with us, this is a good number to start with.”
MCFC opens its ISL 2016 campaign with an away tie on October 3 against FC Pune City.
