Veteran football coach, Loveday Omoruyi has highlighted the advantages and disadvantages of a 2-1 victory recorded over Egypt’s under-20 team by Nigeria’s yiuth national team, Flying Eagles.
While acknowledging the psychological impact of the win, and labelled it as a huge morale booster heading into the African U20 Cup of Nations in Egypt, Omoruyi warned that Coach Aliyu Zubairu’s wards must not get carried away by the feat.
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Loveday Omoruyi, who was a hard-tackling and outspoken defender during his heyday, pointed out: “A test game is different from a competition match. A test game is where you will try out one or two tactics. It will also help you try one or two players, so you will know who to come in if someone gets injured.
“It will help you see each tactic and know who to go in if one does not work; or how will you change the formation of play. So, we can not truly predict from a test game what will really happen during the competition itself.”
Omoruyi then spoke about the merits of such a biild-up match, especially as it was against a North African country, like Tunisia and Morocco – the first two teams that the Flying Eagles will face at this year’s U20 AFCON.
“Psychologically, it was a very good result for us, because we are going to play two other North African countries that play the same way with Egypt. So, it’s a good thing that we won that game, and it would boost the morale of our players,” Omoruyi rationalised.
Sports247 adds that Flying Eagles will open their campaign at Egypt 2025 against Tunisia this Thursday, after which they play Morocco on Sunday and end their Group B campaign the following Wednesday versus Kenya.
The top two countries in the group will not only move on to the semi-finals, they would also have guaranteed for themselves tickets to the FIFA U20 World Cup that will be hosted by Chile
