The Nigerian Professional League has been on break for weeks now as they prepare to welcome another season ahead. This has given the opportunity for the home based Super Eagles to converge for the forth-coming African Nations Championship, CHAN tournament. The home Eagles will this weekend face the Black Galaxies of Ghana, Nigeria’s rival and West African counterparts.
Ahead of the first leg of the CHAN qualifier with Ghana in Abuja, coach of the side, Salisu Yusuf, has shared lights about the fitness of both his team and that of his opponent. Despite the dormancy of members of the team lately, he still thinks that the Ghanaians will not stop Nigeria from making things happen come this weekend. “Apart from rivalry, presently, thier team is ahead of us on match fitness. You cannot doubt that. But I still believe that we have the boys that can fight and bring us the result.” The ghanaians have before now gone on tour, played friendlies and had earlier beaten Benin Republic home and away prior to the match against Nigeria while the Super Eagles have managed to play little or no friendlies in recent time.
In preparation for the tough encounter with the ghanians, assistant coach of the side, Fatai Osho, has hinted that it’s been very difficult preparing the team since the club sides are on break, hence no teams to play friendly matches with. “We have been trying to get them club sides to play friendlies but as you can see, most of the NPFL sides are so inconsistent, they are not even in camp at the moment. So it’s very difficult to get thier players together and plays matches this time”
As the qualifiers draw nearer, with six days away, the home based Super Eagles cannot afford to give the ticket to participate in next year’s CHAN tournament away to Ghana as the Super Eagles earlier gave away the World Cup ticket to Ghana, which still leaves a bitter taste in the mouth of football lovers in Nigeria.
