Chennaiyin FC player-manager Marco Materazzi expressed his delight following his side's 3-1 win over FC Pune City, insisting that his side "deserved to win" on Wednesday.
After recording successive draws in their last four Indian Super League fixtures, the Abhishek Bachchan co-owned side needed to win this game convincingly in order to move to the top of the table.
And they did exactly that courtesy strikes from Stiven Mendoza , Bruno Pelissari and Jeje Lalpeklhua.
"It was not good to get the draws in the last four games and we deserved to win [today]," said Materazzi, according to ISL's official website, after his side's positive result on Wednesday.
"Today the team played extremely well, and we won as a team.I am very happy with a 3-1 victory and hopefully we can take the confidence to the next game."
The former Inter Milan defender went on to praise Pelissari, who put in a match winning performance after coming in as a replacement for the injured Elano.
"Bruno has played just three games, but for me, tonight, I want to say thank you for having a wonderful game." Materazzi added. "Now I have Elano and Bruno in the same side!"
Despite Gouramangi Singh and Mendoza picking up knocks during the game, the Italian says that he is not worried, insisting that they have enough strength in their squad.
"The team has enormous depth in me, Silvestre, Abhishek Das, Balwant, so we are a team and we should do well," Materazzi added.
Meanwhile, FC Pune City boss Franco Colomba admitted that his side were outplayed by a very strong Chennaiyin team.
"They look very strong and it was very difficult for us to comeback against an attacking side, the moment we conceded the goal."
Although an Eric Djemba-Djemba own goal managed to quickly cancel out Mendoza's second half opener, Pelissari immediately restored Chennaiyin FC's lead.
And the Italian boss says that he was "angry with the goal", feeling that Pune should not have lost concentration.
"A goal changes the game and I am angry with the goal that we conceded from kickoff," fumed Colomba. "We should have maintained the concentration and I have to ensure we work on this aspect in the future games."
Finally, the former Napoli boss says that they need to quickly learn from their mistakes and avoid repeating them in their remaining fixtures.
"We must take this experience and learn from the mistakes we made and try to avoid them in the upcoming games."
