Mumbai City FC agonizingly missed out on winning back-to-back League Shields after losing to Mohun Bagan Super Giant in the final game of the league stage. Despite that setback, there is no denying that the Islanders have shown a level of consistency since last season that hasn’t been seen all that often in the history of the Indian Super League.

MCFC have racked up 93 points since the start of last season and no other team got within even 10 points of their tally. The Islanders even accomplished this despite a lot of things being different in the two campaigns.

The first was that Des Buckingham departed the club after last season and was replaced by Petr Kratky. The Islanders also saw some big names like Ahmed Jahouh and Mourtada Fall depart before the start of this season and Greg Stewart left midway through it.

We have seen teams go off the boil when the man at the helm changes and some big players leave, but that wasn’t the case here. So, let’s have a deeper look at what changed and what didn’t in the two league campaigns for the Islanders.

For starters, they were great at keeping the ball last season and it has been more of the same this time as well. MCFC ranked second in the league for possession last season at 58.1% and were top this time around at 57.4%. It wasn’t just possession for possession’s sake either, as they averaged a league-high 2.5 goals per game last season. There was a bit of slippage this time around, as the Islanders averaged 1.9 goals per game, but it was still good enough to rank second.

As for why some of this slippage occurred, their shot conversion rate went down. MCFC had a rate of 16.29% last season, which was the best in the league but they rank third this season at 13.1%.

A big reason for the dip was star forward Jorge Pereyra Diaz seeing a drop in his conversion rate. Diaz was at a ridiculous 32.3% last season but came down to 21.6% this time around. That’s still great, just not the second-best mark in the league like it was last season (among players who scored at least 5 goals).

Another change in the attacking setup that we saw from the Islanders was that they crossed a lot more this season. In ISL 9, they ranked second from bottom in crosses attempted with 310 while they ranked fourth in ISL 10 with 440.

Midfield was where there was a huge change, with Jahouh departing. Replacing a player of his caliber was not going to be easy, but the Islanders managed to bring in Yoell van Nieff. Yoell (1.0 tackles, 1.0 interceptions, 45.5 successful passes per 90, and 1.8 key passes per 90) couldn’t quite duplicate what Jahouh did last season (2.9 tackles, 1.7 interceptions, 59.5 successful passes per 90, and 1.7 key passes per 90), but provided some stability to that midfield post his departure.

On the defensive end, there were two significant changes, as Akash Mishra and Tiri were brought in. Tiri was the replacement for the outgoing Fall while Mishra came in at left-back, an area where there had been a lot of chopping and changing in ISL 9.

The new arrivals certainly helped strengthen the defense. MCFC allowed the fifth-most shots in the league in 2022-23 with 263 while this time around, they allowed the second-fewest with 228. The Islanders have the best defensive record as a result, having conceded just 0.9 goals per game. Despite allowing all those shots last season, MCFC still only conceded 1.05 goals per game, which was the third-best mark in the league.

So, despite some of those big names departing, the Islanders didn’t really miss a beat thanks to the core that was retained and some solid recruitment. They have also now managed to go a step further than last season in the playoffs by making it to the final, where they’ll be playing against Mohun Bagan. It’s a chance at revenge after losing out on the shield and it will be interesting to see if MCFC can get the job done.