FC Goa begin their 2016 Hero Indian Super League campaign against NorthEast United FC at the Indira Gandhi Athletic Stadium in Guwahati on Tuesday. The Gaurs have never lost against NorthEast and will be looking to extend their unbeaten record against them as they also look to make a positive start to their campaign. However speaking to the media on Monday, FC Goa head coach Zico didn’t place too much importance on that piece of stat.“Every year is a different story. We don’t want to think too much about what happened in the past. We just play for now and we play to win all the games and doesn’t matter who is the opponent,” the Brazilian legend said.Zico also said his players were itching to get into the thick of things. “I think they need games now. I think it is one thing playing in the pre-season and another playing in the league for three points. Unfortunately, we don’t have our full squad because we have some injuries and all but this is one thing we are used to in this league. However, we are prepared to play.”The Gaurs are likely to be without a few key players like Denzil Franco, Subhashish Roy Chowdhury and Robin Singh. When pressed on if it may have a deterring effect on his side, Zico said: “It was not a problem because some of these player were not picked before. And the club had to take some decisions and they were picked. Subhashish is a player that I know very well. He went with us to Brazil, to see if we could help him recover from his knee injuries. He has recovered but he has other problems, one chronical problem he has had in the past and we lost him there.“Robin played all the matches with us in Brazil but after arriving here he had some problems in his hamstrings during warm-ups. Denzil had some muscle problems, and needs to take care of them. These are problems that happen with players that have had knee injuries. They recover from these injuries and stay off the game for a long time and then when they play again they feel they have another problem.”The Highlanders will be playing their second game in less than 72 hours when they take on Goa. When asked if this may give his side an edge over the hosts, he said: “It is a normal standard time. Everywhere in the world, they do this. We are going to do it four times at home. To play in 72 hours. So I think it is better if you do it at the beginning of the league because everyone wants to play. If you tell them, play every day, they are going to play every day now. And for us, we are going to do this towards the end of the league. That’s when players are injured. So it is not a positive point for us and not even a negative point for NEUFC. It’s a normal thing.”
