Analysing his team’s performance in the match, the former Olympian said, “We were a little sluggish in the first half and took longer than usual to get into our groove. There was a sea change in our approach in the second half. We completely dominated Bengaluru and given the amount of chances we created, we should have ended up winning. That has been the story of this tournament where we failed to capitalise on the numerous goal-scoring opportunities,” opined Tirumalvalavan.

The coach said he took a lot of heart from how quickly his players responded to the challenge and that they were not daunted by the opposition. “There was hardly any time to prepare as we assembled the team just a few days before the tournament started. Even so, my team was up for the challenge and had we either won or drawn our opening game against Indian Navy, things would have been different. We held the upper hand against Navy but because of our failure to seize the chances, we failed to drive home the advantage. 

“We did well in the second game against Punjab & Sindh Bank by earning a point. I knew we didn’t stand a chance against IOC, which is technically much superior and is the best team in the tournament,” added the Chennai coach. 

Tirumalvalavan reserved high words of praise for full-back J Sathish who hails from Vellore. “He has played with maturity beyond his years. He is blessed with loads of ability and has been a wonderful find for us.”

Tirumalvalavan said his team’s immediate assignment will be the Nehru Cup and the Bombay Gold Cup. “We will conduct a camp for three weeks before those two events. We need to get our players in shape and right now we are looking to strengthen our team by adding another three or four players to the existing bunch. That should help us cover all our bases,” remarked Tirumalvalavan.