Mahindra United, who were the I-League champions in 2005-06, are now languishing at the 11th spot in the tables after the first phase of the championship this season, with only nine points from 10 matches. In the Federation Cup, too, they fared poorly, crashing out after the quarter-final stage.

Coach Pereira, meanwhile, reckons that the recession and its impact apart, the players should take some of the blame for their inability to convert chances throughout the season. What is worse, the coach believes that the players lost much of their mental strength as the season progressed.

To counter the problem, Pereira has suggested the Mahindra United management that a sports psychologist should be consulted. The experienced coach told The Indian Express: “We didn’t have a completely dissatisfactory performance. We just lost points due to the players’ inability to score enough goals. It is not that most of our players are inexperienced. Somehow they didn’t click. I feel they need systematic mental boost-up to redesign their psychological strength. Only a qualified sports psychologist can give such systematic mental training. But again, that is an expensive idea. Amidst the financial crisis, I don’t want to pressurize the management right now, although it’s highly necessary.”

In fact, the Mahindra United coach had chalked out the need as long as 12 months back. He introduced yoga in the team and made it mandatory for the players to focus on meditation techniques.

Dr Ganesh Rao, who is a yoga specialist in Mumbai, had conducted classes for the Mahindra United players. But some of the big names in the team began to drop out and allegedly paid scant respect to the new techniques tried out.

To add to that, injuries to some key players like Nigerian defender Lamine Tamba, NP Pradeep and Stephen Dias also mattered in the team’s average showing in recent months.