Mumbai, NorthEast eye win in ISL (Preview)

Mumbai City FC will be looking for their second successive win when they face an in-form NorthEast United FC in an Indian Super League (ISL) football contest here on Friday.

Mumbai won their opening round clash against FC Pune City 1-0 on October 3.

The win boosted their confidence, which they will need in abundance against NorthEast United who have won both their matches so far, against Kerala Blasters 1-0 and FC Goa 2-0, to be on top of the standings.

"We won against a very good team. Pune is one of the contenders (for the title) this season. That game is now behind us and from the next day we started to focus on our second game. It's always nice to start with a win. The confidence grows," said Mumbai City coach Alexandre Guimaraes in a release on Thursday.

Mumbai will be up against a team which has won both their matches and Guimaraes admitted they are confronted by a strong team.

"They deserved to win the first two games and we will have to play even better and harder to win this game," said the Costa Rican coach.

Mumbai's marquee player Diego Forlan will once again be the focus of attention.

The Uruguayan superstar showed glimpses of his capability against Pune, assisting in creating the only goal of the match.

He was given little space to operate but still managed to conjure up a game-altering chance. It is likely he will receive similar attention from NorthEast players.

"We are trying to find solutions in offence and for Diego not to have all the responsibility to score. Our top scorer (Gaston Sangoy) during pre-season was injured which is bad for us. Then we are missing Sony (Norde) because of international matches," said the Mumbai coach.

"These are big guys for us but I think we managed well and tomorrow it will be another test for us to improve in that area."

NorthEast United are brimming with self belief but coach Nelo Vingada is not taking anything for granted.

"For me tomorrow is the most important and also the most difficult game. We are here to make life hard for Mumbai. It won't be easy for us but we will try to make things difficult for them," said the Portuguese coach.

Vingada, with experience of coaching in several Asian countries, was glad to have started his new job with a win.

"The first game in any league is always not the real game for both teams. It was not a great game for both sides. The best thing was the result. We deserved to win because we created many chances."

"Against Goa, it was intense, very good opportunities for both teams to score and lot of emotions. We were lucky because we scored twice and the goalkeeper made a lot of good saves," said Vingada.

--IANS

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