Antonio German lauds Kerala fans, labels them best in India

German exults after scoring against Mumbai (Image courtesy ISL)

The Blasters from Kerala have endured a see-saw season in the Hero Indian Super League this year. From starting on an extremely bright note to sustaining a run of losses and seeing their manager get the boot mid-season, they have been far from consistent and that reflects in their position in the points table. In fact with two matches to go, they are all but out of the race to qualify for the play offs.

One thing that has made the franchisee stand out though is the plethora of people which flock in to their fortress in Cochin every time they step on pitch. The team’s highest goalscorer from this year, Antonio German reflected on the same in his post match interview to the organising media team yesterday, “Our supporters are the best! Win, lose or draw they have always been there for us. For me, even when I missed six games through injury they were always there to show their support. [They are] probably the best fans in India and I’m sorry that we couldn’t progress.”

About scoring and contributing to the team’s performance on the day, he added, “It’s always good to get on the score-sheet but the fact that we drew the game is a loss to us basically. We needed to win the game and disappointed that we couldn’t.”

As aforementioned though, the draw means his team have little or no chance of advancing and German expressed a deep sense of lament about the situation, “I don’t know if it’s mathematically out [of the question]; all I know is we needed to win all three games and this is a loss to us. I think we have to just re-build for the next season really.”

Finally talking about compatriot Sanchez Watt’s injury, he concluded, “To be honest, we’re still scoring goals you know. We’re still one of the highest scorers in the league and we’re playing good football. We just have to keep going. Two games left, we still have to put in performances in those two games whether we are out or not.”