Tampines Rovers coach V. Sundramoorthy is refusing to give up on the title race just yet.

A 1-0 victory over Hougang United pushed the Stags up into third in the league standings, six points behind league leaders Brunei DPMM with a game in hand.

With seven games to go in the season, and a game against DPMM next month, it is still possible for Sundram’s charges to overtake DPMM.

Sundram believes that there is still hope for his side, but maintains that they should take one game at a time instead.

“There’s still a glimpse of hope, but for us it’s important to take to the next game and win the game,” Sundram said.

“Yes, it is important to move up the ladder, and now we are in third position. It’s good to go up.

“But now, we need to assess the injuries, and move on to the next game in two days time.”

Tampines were made to fight for the win, with Hougang not making it easy. In fact, Tampines endured a nervy ending as they tried to hold on to their one-goal lead.

“We needed the second goal to cool down everything, but it wasn’t coming as we kept missing chances,” Sundram stated.

“The last 10 minutes we needed to really work hard to keep the lead, and we even had to throw in (Rodrigo) Tosi to mark (Vuk) Sotirovic.”

Hougang coach Salim was left to rue the mistake that led to Jamil Ali’s goal, which consigned his side to defeat – their 10th of the season.

However, he was still pleased with his charges’ overall performance after they played according to instructions.

“Sometimes, players have to understand in that situation, they should just play cautious,” Salim said.

“I have to say, the team played according to the game plan so that was very satisfying. I think we matched them in every department… just one uncharacteristic error resulted in the goal.”