The team of Northeast United FC can still reach the playoffs in the sixth season of the Hero Indian Super League. But for this, the team needs to perform brilliantly in the rest of its matches and it will want to start with the match against Kerala Blasters at Indira Gandhi Athletic Stadium here on Friday. Northeast United's team is ranked ninth in the table with 11 points from 13 matches. They can still make their way into the top-4. But for this, the team needs to win the remaining five matches. However, this is a difficult task for the team as they have won only two matches so far this season. Northeast United, who had traveled to the semi-finals last year, has been in trouble since the exit of their star player Esamoh Gian. Since Gian's departure, the team has not scored a single goal in the last four matches. The team of NorthEast would like to get the first victory of this year.

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Northeast United coach Robert Journey said, "We had a lot of problems with the strikers. We did not have other strikers. Esamoah was also out after Maximilian Bareiro left. In the last four games we have played well. But we could not score. That is our problem."

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On the other hand, the good thing for Kerala Blasters is that Bartholomew has scored 11 goals so far for the Ogbeche team while he has scored seven goals in the last five games. Kerala suffered a crushing 3-6 defeat to Chennaiyin FC in their last match, which also clouded the team's hopes of reaching the playoffs. Kerala have had to eat 12 goals in the last three games. Kerala Blasters assistant coach Ishfaq Ahmed said, "Our defense against Chennai was not a complete failure. There was more of a personal mistake. We had dominance till the 38th minute. We need to rectify the mistakes. We worked on it.

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