Bengaluru FC became the first team to book a Hero Indian Super League (ISL) 2017-18 playoff berth, as they defeated FC Goa 2-0 at the Sree Kanteerava Stadium in Bengaluru on Friday. Goals from Edu Garcia and Dimas Delgado ensured that the Blues now sit eight points clear at the top of the table. Post an entertaining encounter between the league’s two most offensively-gifted teams, indiansuperleague.com caught up with goalscorer Delgado and young defender Nishu Kumar for their take on the landmark victory. Here are the excerpts from the interview.

Thoughts on the game?

Delgado: Firstly, I want to say thank you to all our supporters because they’re always amazing in supporting us and we want more of that on the field. I am so happy that we are in the semi-finals. Our goal is already achieved but nothing is done and we need to keep fighting and keep pushing to go for the next match. So (we will) be humble and be like we are and start to prepare for the next match.

Nishu: As you know FC Goa is a very tough team, but it was a good game. We followed what our coach said, what our strategies were and we were lucky that the game was positive for us.

Was there a sense of revenge tonight as Goa beat you last time around?

Delgado: No, nothing like revenge. It is a different game and I think over there we played very well but they won. Today was a different match. We had a very good week and we know how difficult it is to play against Goa, but we did very well and we are happy.

Nishu: We were home and the West Block Blues were there. So, it was a motivation for us to give everything. We had lost the reverse fixture, so we had to take our revenge and all of us did well. It was a good result.

Delgado, talk us through your goal.

Well, it was a fast move. We tried to play through. It was with Toni (Dovale) and he tried to play a through ball, but it got deflected and in the end, it came to me. I thank God that I could finish well. I am really happy as I managed to help my team.

Nishu, how is the team atmosphere now?

Now everyone is happy as the team is doing well. We are very happy.

Bengaluru FC have both Hero ISL and AFC fixtures, so did the depth of the squad come handy?

We had Hero ISL matches so our fixtures were a little hectic. The coach had to rotate the squad but all of us did well and the result was fine.

What will be Bengaluru FC’s focus now?

We’ll continue our performance and I hope we reach the final. I hope we do well in the AFC fixtures as well and hope we qualify there as well.