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The 22-year-old Indian midfielder, who was recently called up to the Indian national team by Stephen Constantine, has been with I-League club Shillong Lajong since 2014. He had loan stints in ISL with NorthEast United in 2014 and 2015, registering a total of seven appearances. The 2017-18 season saw Alen Deory emerging as an important first team player at Lajong with 12 appearances and a goal to his name. He has come through the ranks of Sports Authority of India (SAI) and also had a stint in the All India Football Federation’s (AIFF) Elite Academy....

Bete played for 2015 champions Chennaiyin FC last season and for Atletico de Kolkata in the inaugural season of the ISL. Bete has once been a member of French giants Paris Saint-Germain. The 30-year old born and raised in Cameroon, has dual nationality, but represented Armenia at U-19, U-23 and senior level. He also represented multiple times Israeli champions Hapoel Tel Aviv from 2011-2013. “My experience playing in India has been memorable to say the least....

Both goalkeepers are expected to play provide backup for the club’s first choice custodian Amrinder Singh who has penned a fresh deal. Arindam Bhattacharya, who played second-fiddle to Amrinder in the recently concluded ISL season, is moving to ATK as revealed by Goal earlier and the club has acted swiftly to bring in replacements. Kunal Sawant was a part of Kerala Blasters in the 2016 season of the ISL before being picked up by the Islanders in the Players Draft last year....

Goal had revealed earlier that Popovic and FC Pune City were set to part ways. The former Real Zaragoza & Buriram United FC coach joined the Stallions in September 2017 taking over the reins from Antonio Habas. They finished fourth on the league table but was knocked out by Bengaluru FC in the semi-finals. Young players like Gurtej Singh, Ashique Kuruniyan and Sarthak Golui flourished under his guidance as the club ended up scoring 31 goals through the season, more than twice of what the club scored in its previous season....

Tiri had signed a pre-contract with ISL club Kerala Blasters Tiri had reportedly penned a pre-contract with Kerala Blasters in February 2020 which was supposed to keep the central defender at the ISL club for three years. However, it has come to light now that the Blasters have seemingly asked Tiri to take a 40% wage cut on the figure that was decided earlier. Tiri is an established name in the ISL....

Also Read: FC Pune City showed immense intensity in defeat says assistant manager Miguel NorthEast United scored a solitary goal victory over Kerala Blasters in the opening encounter with Japanese midfielder Katsumi Yusa scoring the all-important goal. The start was encouraging for new head coach Nelo Vingada but the Portuguese coach knows there is plenty of scope for improvement. Also Read: Hard work in practice sessions paid off, says Mumbai City FC manager Alexandre Guimaraes...

Speaking about playing in India, the former Manchester United and Atletico Madrid striker spoke positively about his experience till now, “This is my second time in India. I was here in 2010 as well. We have a good team this season. We know the club didn’t qualify for the play offs in the last two years, so we’re looking forward to that challenge and do our best”, he said....

Both the Spaniards in charge, Albert Roca and Miguel Angel, named unchanged lineups, possibly due to a reluctance to tinker with a winning formula. Bengaluru had two chances to take the lead within the first two minutes – first with Eduardo Garcia feeding the ball to Erik Paartalu before Gabriel Cichero intercepted in time and then Garcia found Miku with a cross, whose header came back off the woodwork....

A video went viral, showing a boy dancing in a vulgar manner in front of a female NorthEast fan. An official within Chennaiyin FC confirmed to Sportskeeda that the boy was drunk, and was indeed eve-teasing the NorthEast fan. The context The video shows that a group of NorthEast fans were sitting in a row and the young man in front of them, who was supposedly a Chennaiyin fan, started dancing and gesticulating in a peculiar manner....

Chennaiyin, who conceded three goals in the opening half of their ISL opener against FC Goa, are yet to ship a goal in the 225 minutes of football after that and John Gregory is confident of maintaining another cleansheet on Thursday. In particular, he pointed out that his defence, led by former ATK defender Henrique Sereno, managed to muzzle Marcelinho and Emiliano Alfaro in Pune in their last game. “When we played in Pune, they had both Alfaro and Marcelinho who are excellent forwards,” Gregory told reporters at the pre-match press conference....

According to sources, Gustavo Conceicao - a teammate of Kaka’s during his brief stay at Orlando City back in 2015 and a former Mohun Bagan player - hasn’t painted a rosy picture of Indian football to Kaka. Gustavo has not recommended the ISL to Kaka given the trouble the Brazilian defender faced during his short spell in India. Kaka, 35, who is currently the captain of Major League Soccer (MLS) outfit Orlando City, is likely to spurn the advances from India and stay put at his current club at least until his current contract expires at the end of this year....

New entrants Jamshedpur FC, owned by the Tata Group appointed former Kerala Blasters head coach Steve Coppell to lead their debut conquest in the ISL. The former Manchester United winger brought with him his assistant coach from this old club in the form of Ishfaq Ahmed. The Jharkhand-based side started their pre-season training camp in Jamshedpur from the first week of October and embarked on a fortnight-long trip to Thailand thereafter....

The issue is every team in the league will go through spells when they cannot find the back of the net partly because of their own wastefulness in front of goal or failure to break down an opposition. It is at this juncture that one’s greatest test lies. To be fair to FC Pune City coach Ranko Popovic, he shared his plans for FC Goa out in the open. He acknowledged that Sergio Lobera’s side have some special players who they need to keep a check on....

Ranko Popovic’s men started the game on the back foot and conceded an early goal when Balwant Singh found the back of the net with a sensational strike from outside the area on the 15th minute. The Stallions slowly started finding their feet and continued to dominate possession, heading into the halftime break as the stronger side. Pune were finally rewarded when Raju Gaikwad brought down Diego Carlos in the 71st minute and Alfaro converted from the spot with ease to level things up....

The ISL has been restructured this season as they welcome two new sides in Bengaluru FC and Jamshedpur FC. The Tata Group’s Jamshedpur FC are a new franchise while Bengaluru FC have won the I-League in the past. After completely dominating the I-League in their first four seasons of existence, they will now begin their journey in the ISL for bigger and better challenges. The season kicks off with a rematch of ISL 2016 final as defending champions ATK travel to Kochi where they come up against Kerala Blasters on November 17th....

In case you didn’t know… Albert Roca, was a Spanish central defender during his time, after which he took on the job as head coach for I-League champions, Bengaluru FC in July 2016. It was under his guidance that the team became the first Indian club to reach the finals of the AFC Cup. It was also under Roca’s guidance that they won the Federation Cup 2016-2017. He was met with loud cheers and requests to stay on at the club when he walked onto the field during Bengaluru’s FC’s home game against Aizawl FC on Wednesday....

In case you didn’t know… If one takes a look at the goalkeepers from the Premier League or Serie A, one will find that Dorronsoro is relatively shorter as compared to them. The Spaniard stands at 5 ft 11 in, inches short of the average mark. However, this is a very well known trend in Spanish football, with the average goalkeeper height in the Spanish leagues being almost two inches shorter than that of the English Leagues....

Gabriel who last played for East Bengal in the I-League enters Indian Super League with FC Pune City after a gap of two years. Speaking on signing the Goan winger, FC Pune City CEO Gaurav Modwel said, “Gabriel’s speed and agility on the wings gives the team good options. We know with his sharpness and direct play, he has the potential to be one of the standout players for us this season....

In case you didn’t know… The ISL has been a breath of fresh air for Indian football in the last few years, bringing in a number of star-studded names to the country, which, in turn, drew a number of fans, who were previously interested only in European football. The league had started off with a total quota of 11 foreign players per squad in the inaugural season in 2014, when the likes of Luis Garcia, Robert Pires, Marco Materazzi, Simao Sabrosa, Freddy Ljungberg, Alessandro Del Piero, all took to the field in front of the Indian audience....