Habas blasts referee, says NEUFC won thanks to a "rubbish penalty"

ATLETICO DE KOLKATA head coach Antonio Lopez Habas on Saturday said the penalty which was awarded to NorthEast United, and ensured their win, was "rubbish".

Habas told reporters here at the post match media conference,

"It was a rubbish penalty. The match today was about the referee and not us."

It was a corner which was floated in as NorthEast's Carlos Lopez and ATK midfielder Ofentse Nato went for the ball. Television replays showed there was almost no contact between Nato and the striker but the Canadian referee David John Gantar thought otherwise and pointed to the spot in the seventh minute. Sambrosa stepped up and calmly slotted it past Atletico custodian Amrinder Singh who went the right way but failed to get to the ball.

The visitors then held onto the slender advantage for the rest of the game to collect a hard fought 1-0 win.

Speaking on the Salt Lake stadium turf which has received much flak lately, Habas said,

" It is not at all fantastic. It keeps getting bad. We cannot even train on the pitch. In the last 45 days we have just practiced here for two hours."

He also introduced his foreign striker Valdo and his trusted defender Arnab Mandal after the first half,

"We were trying out something different, so we put Valdo and Mandal inside together."

He remained tight-lipped about the quality of refereeing but added all other teams might have to face the same consequences as ATK did on Saturday,

"Today it was us (at the receiving end) tomorrow it will be a new team facing it."

Habas also refused to comment on his job being on the line. Asked if he would suffer the same fate as Kerala Blasters manager Peter Taylor who was sacked recently, Habas said,

"No opinion on that."