12 Kolkata: By East Bengal FC coach Oscar Bruzon's own admission, his team still wears the look of a hospital ward, but the situation is "slowly getting better."
But first-up, take for example the players struck off the roster for Friday's match against Kerala Blasters at the Salt Lake Stadium. Anwar Ali and Saul Crespo are still recovering, Hector Yuste is not "fit" to play for 90 minutes and Mohd Rakip and Prabhat Lakra are out of reckoning as well. Bruzon was forced to use Nandhakumar Sekar as a right-back in the previous match against FC Goa last Sunday but with the right-winger now suspended for earning four yellows, the Spanish coach has again been forced to rejig his defence and may employ midfielder Jeakson Singh in the right-back's position.
If this is not enough, East Bengal's predicament can also be gauged from the fact that with three back-to-back losses, their playoff hopes are hanging by a thread. They are lying at 11th with 14 points from 16 matches, 10 points off the sixth-placed Odisha FC.
Bruzon, however, again highlighted the poor start to the campaign, losing the first six games in a row. "When you complete the 25% of the games with zero points, the problem (in the latter half of the season) is going to be bigger," he told reporters on Thursday.
All eyes will be on new Venezuelan attacker Richard Celis who made an impressive debut against FC Goa. Bruzon also hopes that last season's Golden Boot winner Dimitrios Diamantakos will find this meeting with his former club as an opportunity to return to form.
Kerala Blasters, who are eighth with 21 points from 17 matches, are eyeing a double on the red-and-gold side, having won the home leg 2-1 back on Sept 22.
Bruzon described Blasters as "a team that relies a lot on the counter-attacks and a team that usually does the second half better than the first half."
Jesus Jimenez and Noah Sadaoui are spearheading their attack with 10 and 7 goals respectively while Adrian Luna's efficacy in the midfield is well known to the rival coaches.
However, Blasters have conceded 27 times leaving their interim coach TG Purushothaman with work to do.
Can Celis and Diamantakos make the most of this defensive fallibity from the visitors?
"Despite our struggles, we are thinking of nothing but a win tomorrow," Bruzon said on Thursday.