NEUFC forward Deshorn Brown scored a hat-trick on his return from injury while Igor Angulo and Bipin Singh netted for Mumbai City FC to share points.
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NorthEast United FC boss Khalid Jamil lauded his team’s performance after the thrilling 3-3 draw against defending champions Mumbai City FC in the Indian Super League (ISL) fixture at Jawaharlal Nehru stadium on Monday. NEUFC forward Deshorn Brown scored a hat-trick on his return from injury while Igor Angulo and Bipin Singh netted for Mumbai City FC to share points. The draw helped the Islanders to take a 3 point lead at the top of the table while NorthEast remained at the 9th spot with 8 points from 9 games.
A thriller in Fatorda ? ?#StrongerAsOne #TogetherWeAreInfinite #NEUMCFC pic.twitter.com/4M4SUcWbPY
— NorthEast United FC (@NEUtdFC) December 28, 2021
Brown opened the scoring in the 29th minute before goals from Angulo and Bipin put MCFC’s nose in front before the break. In the 52md minute, Angulo completed his brace. But three minutes later, Brown reduced the deficit and then 10 minutes from time, the Jamaican completed his brace to share the spoils.
Brown’s return gave Jamil’s side the much needed pace and physical prowess up front, which they were lacking in the previous game. He was able to get behind the Mumbai defence and find spaces on a regular basis. Meanwhile MCFC’s central defenders Mehtab Singh and Rahul Bheke couldn’t handle the 31-year-old.
Jamil said after the match ”Talking about Brown, he came to us last year and from then he’s been an important part of the team. This time also coming after an injury he and Mathias Coureur combined very well. Matthias also did a good job. I should mention Sehnaj Singh and Pragyan Gogoi, both have done a good job today in the center.”
Brown is NEUFC’s top scorer with four goals while VP Suhair has netted three times. Other than these two, none of the NEUFC players have hit the target more than once this season so far. When asked about the shortage of goal contribution from different players, the Indian tactician said “ Eeverybody is working hard. Talking about the goals which he scored, I think even Matthias played a crucial role in those goals. Imran Khan came in and he also did a good job. Patrick Flottmann and Hernan Santana defensively were good.”
Jamil deployed Sehnaj Singh and Pragyan Gogi in the central midfield, which allowed the likes of Imran Khan and Suhair to play more freely up front. Imran provided the assist for two of the three goals the Highlanders scored on Monday.
The first goal which Brown scored was from a counter-attack. Imran delivered a precise diagonal ball to release Brown on goal and the Jamaican made no mistake as he chested it down before using his pace to get past the defender and slot home.
When asked about Imran’s performance, Jamil said “ Yeah, he’s working hard. He also missed the start of the season. We missed him. And he came back. And today we changed his role. We told him to play wide just to supply for Brown. So looking at the overall performance of the team, it was good today.”
