Pellegrini: Injuries Made It Complicated For Villarreal Against Malaga

Villarreal’s ambitions of a top-four finish is in jeopardy after they suffered their second successive league defeat, going down 2-0 at home to Malaga overnight.

Unlike last week when he berated his troops after losing 3-0 at Almeria, coach, Manuel Pellegrini was more understanding this weekend, as he put the blame squarely on the squad’s injury woes.

“Logically, it’s a worry when we lose and we must work to improve. But it’s also true that the injuries have affected us and it made things complicated for us,” he said during the post-match interviews.

“Today, without going into more detail, we were missing almost our entire creative force,” he added.

The Chilean coach also believed that his team never really had any luck on their side against an opportunistic Malaga outfit.

“It was a difficult game and it was one of those days where the ball just did not want to go in,” he sighed.

“Malaga, meanwhile, took advantage of the first shot at goal they had. Then, they struck again on the counter-attack towards the end of the game.

“In any case, I don’t think we played badly. It’s just that we could not convert [our chances]. We could have played all day and the ball still wouldn’t have gone in.”

Villarreal remain in the top four in the Primera Division but they are now just two points ahead of Valencia, who play Sporting Gijon on Sunday, and a win for Los Che would send El Submarino out of the Champions League qualifying zone.

KS Leong, Goal.com