NorthEast United FC will be hoping to end a run of results that sees them winless in their last six matches when they host FC Pune City at the Indira Gandhi Athletic Stadium in Guwahati on Tuesday. The Highlanders drew away to Atlético de Kolkata in their last outing and head into the tie against Pune having lost their past three encounters at home to Chenniyin FC, ATK and Mumbai City FC respectively.A crunch match as far as their semis aspirations are concerned, NorthEast’s head coach Nelo Vingada issued a rallying cry to their passionate fans and vowed that the Highlanders will fight for a win as they bid to keep their season alive. “So, tomorrow is going to be a difficult game and the most important one as it is a crucial game. We need to get three points for our motivation. In the last two games, we missed five points but according to the way we played, we deserved six points but since this is football its always unpredictable. We may have missed chances and we had our opportunities to score but we couldn’t convert and finish the game and they (FC Goa and Atlético de Kolkata) ended up scoring in the last few minutes but we’re still not K.O’d, we’re still alive but tomorrow we have to win, we need to be strong and special,” Vingada told reporters in Guwahati.He continued: “My request to the NorthEast United fans is that please come to watch the game to encourage the fans because this game is very important and we need to win through their help, and if we do we’ll be in the middle of the fight. We need to be special because Pune has 15 points even when they didn’t start so well, so even we can do this and it’s crucial for us to get the three points.”NorthEast have dropped late points in both of their last two matches with Goa’s Romeo Fernandes and ATK’s Iain Hume scoring in the dying minutes of the games. Commenting on his side’s failure to see out matches, Vingada said: “Of course, I understand why this happened in Goa. It was because I played many players in front, but it was a different situation [against Kolkata] when we had the game in our control and they scored from a free-kick and not a counter-attack, so my team was prepared for this situation [counter-attack]. It happens because its football, we were very upset about how we conceded the goal because we had the ball in our control and it escaped.”Vingada also confirmed that while Mailson Alves and Subrata Paul were fit for the match against Pune, their defensive mainstay Gustavo Lazzaretti will be out of action due to a ligament injury.
