Chennaiyin FC head coach Marco Materazzi is satisfied with his team’s performance as the Super Machans come close to finishing their first half of the league stage with their game against Mumbai City FC at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium in Chennai on Wednesday. With nine points from six matches, the reigning champions will join Atlético de Kolkata at the top of the 2016 Hero Indian Super League table if they win tomorrow, and Materazzi doesn’t have too many complaints from their performances in the first half of the league stage. “I’m happy about the first game [ATK] where we played one of the favourites and we played well [a 2-2 draw]. Our team is almost new because we brought in nearly 5-6 new players, which is a positive thing. Negative is the game against Delhi [which Chennaiyin lost 3-1] but I think there is a little positive in that because after that my players understood that they had to fight for every ball, that they had to have that hunger and that they had to forget the last year. Now we are in the run for the semis, we’re not top of table but we’re not last, so overall everything is going good,” Materazzi told reporters on Tuesday.The Super Machans were held to a 0-0 draw by Kerala Blasters in their last match, and Materazzi said that despite their satisfactory performance so far in the league they weren’t complacent and were treating every game as a final. “All games since I was born are finals for me. Not just the ISL, and if it wasn’t the case I wouldn’t have won the World Cup. Also all managers are like magicians, I am also a magician. We didn’t concede the last game and maybe we should have scored in the first half and they played better in second half so I think draw is a fair result. In this league, if we win the next game we’re top and if we lose we’re fifth. As usual we’ll take every game as a final and give everything we can for a result.”The third edition of the Hero ISL seem pretty close with just three points separating the first six teams in the standings. When asked to comment on that, the 43-year-old Italian said: “My opinion is that the quality of the league has gone up and that’s why we have so many draws this year. The table being so close is a sign that the quality is going up. In our attack, we lost the quality up front with [Stiven] Mendoza not joining us. If he were to come back to India, he would have joined us but he chose to be in New York and I wish him all the best for that. We got in [Hans] Mulder who is great but unfortunately now he is injured because of a tackle in the last game. I wouldn’t care about winning by two goals at the moment [which could take Chennaiyin to the top of the league on goal difference], we could just win with one goal and try our best to make the semis.”Materazzi also agreed that Mumbai City FC marquee player Diego Forlan poses a big threat for his team and that they will have to work in unison to stop the Uruguayan legend on Wednesday. “To stop Forlan, you need the whole team to stop a player like that because if you make one mistake, then he is going to score for sure. I think that’s what gives motivation. That each and every player of my team knows that it’s an honour to play against a champion like him. They’d want to show everybody and show me that they have what it takes to counter-attack a champion player like him,” he said.Besides Mulder, John Arne Riise is also an injury concern for Wednesday’s game. However, midfielder Thoi Singh could make his first appearance this season after returning from injury.
