Hanoi: Despite having fallen to a 2-0 defeat against Vietnam in Hanoi, Malaysia turned on arguably their best performance so far at the AFF Suzuki Cup and goalkeeper Khairul Fahmi insisted post-match that his nation had deserved more from the clash.

Outside of seeing his team concede early in either half there wasn’t much for the experienced custodian to deal with and he was clearly frustrated by what Malaysia view as a missed opportunity.

“This is football, we played better than Vietnam I think and we certainly played better than in our last two games.

“We made two mistakes and Vietnam punished us and that was the difference.”

The loss, combined with a win for Myanmar over Laos, means that Malaysia are locked at the head of Group A with the Asian Lions and the Golden Stars but with qualification still in their own hands come the final round of matches when they host Myanmar.

For the 29-year-old keeper it’s now a question of making sure the team eliminates those small mistakes and then take advantage of an extended gap before their final match in front of what should be a massive crowd at the Bukit Jalil stadium in Kuala Lumpur.

“It showed in this match with Vietnam that in football you must concentrate for 90 minutes and that lack of concentration hurt us but we still have a chance to qualify in the last match so that’s our focus.

“It’s difficult but not impossible because we’ll play on our home ground and we have one week training so we can recover and be ready to go.”