Malouda says failure to 'kill the game' cost Delhi

Delhi Dynamos skipper and marquee signing Florent Malouda said his team's failure to 'kill the game' despite a plethora of chances cost them three points.

Dynamos lost by a solitary penalty from Atletico de Kolkata (ATK)'s Canadian striker Iain Hume in the 78th minute to remain in fourth position.

"The difference was both teams played well but we had the opportunity to kill the game. We could not," Malouda told reporters after the match here.

Coach Gianluca Zambrotta did not want to blame the referee for his decision and said that mistakes committed by the capital side cost them the game.

"I don't speak about the referee. That's not my philosophy. We prepared well. We missed the penalty and made some mistakes. We will look to learn from our mistakes," the Italian World Cup winner said.

Malouda said he is happy with his role in the team saying as a captain he has to take responsibility after a defeat.

"I am happy with the role that I have. There is still a long way to go and we will not worry with the way we play because we will be able to do better. When you lose, the captain has to take responsibility," he said.

ATK counterpart Jose Molina, on the other hand, was all smiles despite being lucky to not settle for their fourth draw as Delhi's Marclo Pereira missed from the spot minutes before Hume converted his take.

"Yes I am absolutely happy. We played a great match. I always told you that of course we can improve but today we had a lot of chances to score but failed to put the ball on target. We dominated the match," the Spaniard said.

Molina said it was due to their mistakes that Delhi came close to scoring.

"All the chances that Delhi had was because we made three or four mistakes. We were the best team inside the pitchl," he said.

Debjit had a good game pulling off a string of three saves in quick succession in the first half. Molina, a goalkeeper himself, lauded his man under the bar.

"Debjit put in a great performance tonight. He proved to everybody today that he is a great goalkeeper. He dominated the box in aerial balls," Molina said.

Dropping Javi Lara and Arnab Mondal from the team, raised a few eyebrows. Molina cleared the air by saying that Lara is down with fever while Mondal was not played because there was a place to draft in a foreign player.

"Javi Lara has fever. He did not train in the last two days. As for Mondal, we had the chance to play an extra foreigner because we did not have Lara, (Helder) Postiga, (Stephen) Pearson, (Ofentse) Nato," Molina said.

On a different note, Malouda, a Champions Lague and Premier League winner with Chelsea, said if the Indian league is made longer, the quality should not drop.

"You need to convert the potential into performance. If the league is longer, the quality should not drop," he said.

"There is a lot of potential to improve. The most important thing is what happens after the ISL in the month of December. The intensity that we see in the ISL needs to be carried forward," he added.

--IANS

dm/vgu/pgh/