Goal.com

04-Dec-2012 12:01:00 AM

The Pune FC coach felt the club gave their best performance of the season, and should have come away with all 3 points...

Pune FC were left stunned by a late rally by a Odafa Okolie inspired Mohun Bagan, as the Red Lizards were held to a 2-2 draw.

While the home side’s players looked visibly distraught after the final whistle, a composed Derrick Pereira spoke to the media soon after the final whistle.

The former Mahindra United coach did hint at disappointment within the camp at the result, as he stated, “Well the final result is not what we wanted. We deserved to win and it hurts a bit. We conceded late goals and were clearly the better side. We defended well and made several goal-scoring chances."

Subhash Singh and James Moga were wasteful, especially the former who could have scored a hat-trick given the number of opportunities he had in the match.

"If our finishing was better, we could have scored several more. This was our best performance of the season. I think apart from the two goals, we played very well and kudos to our players," said Pereira.

He also felt that Odafa’s second goal should have been disallowed. Pune FC were also unlucky not to get the penalty when Echezona Anyichie kicked Subhash Singh in the ribs inside the box and the referee awarded an indirect free-kick to the home side and neither did he give marching orders to the Bagan defender.

“I think the second goal should have been disallowed. Odafa controlled the ball with his hand. The referee overlooked some other decisions as well. Even for the 1^st goal we were unlucky, as it took a massive deflection. However we take a lot of positives from this game."

The Pune FC coach also gave his take on the heated exchanges between some of his players and Odafa Okolie towards the closing stages of the game.

“Odafa should not have come and instigated James Moga like that. Moga only wanted the referee to get on with the game and get Okolie stretchered off (when he was on the ground), as he wasn’t seriously injured in a way that required treatment on the field. Odafa took exception to that," concluded Pereira.

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