Shillong, March 9: Coming towards the crunch end of the season, Shillong Lajong FC face two tough challenges - opponents and injury.

Lajong, sixth on the I-League table, have won just two matches and scored only five goals in 10 matches - the lowest by any club.

Next up for the men in red is an away match against Salgaocar on Saturday, a contest that coach Thangboi Singto expects to be a difficult one.

"I think they (Salgaocar) are much stronger than when we last played them. It's going to be tough. We have six other matches and every one of them is going to be tough, home or away," Singto told The Telegraph yesterday, a day before the team travelled to Goa. "It's an away game and our away record is not that good," he added. Lajong have played five away matches so far and not won any of them.

The Goa team is in worse shape in terms of results, having won two and lost six, which leaves them in eighth place. They have brought in new players and a new coach in the form of former Royal Wahingdoh coach Santosh Kashyap and despite their travails, they boast of this season's top scorer, Darryl Duffy (eight goals). The other problem for the experienced Singto is that three among four of his foreign players are nursing injuries and foreigners "make the difference in every team".

Japanese defender Yusuke Yamagata has a knee problem that has kept him out of the last few games, while the Brazilian forward duo of Uilliams Souza Silva and Fabio Pena have a couple of niggles.

"Yama(gata) has started training but is not fully fit. The only fit foreigner I have is (Nigerian midfielder) Penn Orji," Singto said.

Orji is one of two Lajong footballers who have played every single minute of every match this season, the other being goalkeeper Vishal Kaith, who is among a crop of under-22 players that Lajong have reposed much faith in this season.

"Our Indian players are very talented and want to prove they are on a par with the others. Performance-wise, Vishal has done well and Bipin Singh, Rupert Nongrum and Samuel Lalmuanpuia too," Singto said.

"Skillful and creative" are two of the compliments Singto paid striker Lalmuanpuia, who struck the crossbar in the 0-2 defeat at home to Bengaluru FC last week, a would-be goal that his coach said could have changed the match.

"People talk a lot about physicality and strength, but Iniesta and Neymar aren't that physically strong. But they have football intelligence. We have to build on that with our boys. We're missing some key players in terms of foreigners but our youngsters have done very well," Singto said.