Kerala Blasters FC head coach Ivan Vukomanovic was delighted after the team qualified for the ISL 2021-22 final after beating Jamshedpur FC by 2-1 on aggregate at the Tilak Maidan Stadium, Goa on Tuesday. Vukomanovic stated that it is a great achievement to qualify for the finale.
The Southerners had taken a 1-0 lead in the first-leg and in the end that advantage became crucial in the second leg. Adrian Luna scored in the 18th minute of the game to give an overall 2-0 lead to his team. However, Pronay Halder was able to get one goal back in the 50th minute but Kerala Blasters were able to keep the opposition at bay in the last 40 minutes.
Ivan Vukomanovic said in the post-match presentation, “It’s been a great achievement, I think for the club, first of all, and especially for the fans who were waiting for so long to be where we are standing today. After several years of disappointment and several seasons of less good results, I’d say, we achieved something great today. And I think that we should all be happy, all the yellow family, all the people from Kerala, we all should be happy. These boys tonight, I’m so proud of them. They were fighting so well throughout the whole season. Since we started last year in August, we knew that there is potential and quality to end up top of the table. We knew that tonight we had to face one of the best teams in the league again. We knew that it would be a physical game, we knew that it would be a fight. So, we had to overcome all those things to achieve this.”
He added, “Now it gives us pride, it gives us a great feeling and we want to enjoy the next couple of days. And of course, in the final, we want to enjoy that moment. Because I think that all the people from Kerala and all the people who are following our club and cheering for Kerala Blasters deserve it. They deserve to be here. They deserve to come to see that final. These boys are doing a great job since we started and it was not easy. As a team, if you’re coming second from the bottom from last season, you have to fight and overcome so many hard things. And today we are all proud. We’re all proud and want to continue, especially to sleep over, to be refreshed tomorrow to think about the next couple of days to prepare to the best we can and get the job done.”
Meanwhile, the final will be played in front of the crowd and Vukomanovic added that it means a lot to their team. He feels that the players will be motivated to perform in front of their fans.
Vukomanovic concluded, “It means everything. I think that the boys will have extra motivation seeing the crowd coming in. I think that the fans have suffered a lot throughout these two seasons, especially when there were no results. But I think even more this season where we had such nice results where the fans should actually have fun, and I think that the football we are playing is for the fans, because playing in front of these empty stadiums, it does not give you not a great feeling. The feeling when you play in front of full crowds, it gives you goosebumps, it gives you extra power, it gives you extra motivation to fight for your jersey to fight for your team.”
Kerala Blasters will now look to keep up their good show in the ISL final to win their maiden trophy of the tournament. The Yellow Army will either face Hyderabad FC or ATK Mohun Bagan on Sunday at the PJN Stadium, Fatorda.
