Following a victory against archrivals Abahani Limited for the very first time in two years, Mohammedan’s Portuguese coach Rui Capella Batista duly gave credit to his players for the memorable win on Wednesday. The 48-year old Portuguese coach admitted that luck was in their favour and now they were dreaming of clinching the title. ‘All the credit goes to the players who performed their best against their archrivals Abahani,’ said Batista after the match on Wednesday.
‘I admitted that luck was in favour of us as Abahani wasted a couple of chances, but that is football, we also missed several chances,’ added the Portuguese coach.
After obtaining the lead, Mohammedan succeeded in keeping the lead by executing the coach’s planning.
‘My planning was not to concede a goal after achieving the lead and in the second half we played a little bit defensive football. To fulfil our desire of moving to the final, we have to take a strategy,’ said the Mohammedan coach.
Meanwhile, Abahani’s Iranian coach Ali Akbar claimed that the opposition played negative football which contributed to their defeat.
‘After conceding the goal, our players tried their level-best to restore the margin but they failed because Mohammedan played negative football,’ said Ali Akbar adding that, ‘It is not the perfect sporting spirit as they put in six-seven players in their defence. It’s not positive football.’
He blamed his defenders for conceding the goal and also expressed his frustration with the performances of his attackers.
‘We created a number of chances but our forwards could not utilise those. Our defence made a mistake and Mohammedan scored the goal.
‘I think my players failed to display that kind performance what makes them champions,’ said a discontented Akbar.
-With New Age input
