₦airaland Forum

Goke7:
Una go explain tire, what you folks are not observing is that the current crop of Nigerian players are taking clubs that are not in the elite category of European clubs to the highest levels of accomplishments e.g. osihmen with Napoli, Ademola with Atalanta, boniface with leverkusen, even an Aina with notts is currently 4th in the epl can you beat that? It tells you the impact of these guys in teams with no big players but still pushing them to the summit of the game. And that’s the outcome we are seeing with these awards. No sentiments it’s what it is.

On the other hand, football has changed. You'd never see Brazil and Argentina invite players from Brighton, Westham , Everton to their national teams. It used to be players from AC Milan, Juventus, Real Madrid, Barcelona and such elite teams. But today we've seen McAlister from Brighton now playing for Liverpool play for Argentina.
Football is cyclical and today it's emphasis on national team cohesion as against big clubs players.

But that's not the justification for bringing a player in the English 3rd division into our team. We are not Gabon or any of those lesser african football powerhouses to do such. If we can work out something for our consistent and best players that are playing in teams you mentioned earlier I think that will be great for our national team

Ola Aina giving banger dance steps as Forest come from behind to beat Villa.

ChrisKels:
They are worried that a championship or Epl club will snatch him from them. They said he is classes above the league 1

Wetin be this one again 😂😂🤣..

Kelechi's PR is really strong ooo. They go the extra for that boy always. 🤣🤣

AndSunGorilla:
Another weekend us upon us, hope "Luku the Butcher" cuts teams to size again.

😂😂😂. Africa's best player all the way.

Lookman should remain in Atlanta.
Atalanta is an emerging force in European football. We saw this last night

There is a saying that football begins at 30 in Italy. Lookman is nearing that age and he is the most important player in this rising team.

He is a hero and legend in Atlanta that even when he drops in form he will always get playing time.

EEGA:
Lookman in his last 5 games for Atalanta no longer plays as an AML or LSS but now plays as a false 9 in a 2-man attack ,with Pasalic playing behind them as CAM.

He plays there, it just depends on given instance of play or attack pattern that allows him often move to the false 9 role.

Atalanta just pulled one back. It was from a spot kick. Well converted by CDK. Charles De Ketalare.

Half Time Now.
Atalanta 1-1 Madrid

We got a game in our hands now. Madrid will have to come out and play in the second half.

And Atalanta will not be easy to crack down. I have a hunch CDK will get another goal .

It's a tricky game that has got only a goal more to be scored. Atalanta is currently trailing behind by a goal, but they are struggling to break down the Madrid defence .

Referee decisions have not been the best on both side with decisions slightly in favour of Madrid. It will only a need a goal in the second half to settle this match.

Lookman has been pretty nervy, he needs to calm down. Slow the game to himself. I like that he shoots when he has the chance cos that's only how he can score. Buy then he should be calmer in his final decisions

Ppogbae:
Apparently Osimhen sidelined for 2 weeks. This is becoming a serious issue.

Who go invest money buy am go buy am.

Left to me I'd say he shouldnt miss out from the money when Saudi comes.

charlesemeka85:
Open play chances created this season :

1) Cole Palmer - 35
2) Bernardo Silva - 31
3 Dejan Kulusevski - 28
4) Alex Iwobi - 26
5) Bukayo Saka - 25


Put some respect to Iwobi’s name

Three black guys on the list.
Number 1, 4 and 5.

I'm sure tracing Cole's ancestral genealogy will make him a Nigerian.
So three Nigerians on the list 🤗🥰😂🤪😜

Odunayaw:
Brown Ideye coming to the NPFL

That's nice

I think he won the league with Ocean boys or Bayelsa united back then

maidaboi:
nice

Was Osimhen terrible?

No way was he terrible. How could anyone say Osimhen was terrible.

For posterity sake there was nothing special in Osimhen's AFCON performance. Let's set this clear.

Osimhen's performance was not in any sense bigger than the whole team's performance.

From Stanley Nwabali who was our goalkeeper and the revelation of the tournament. To the balance of play grit and sturdy display of Ekong, Bassey, Aina, calmness of Ajayi.

The midfield brought about Oneyka, whose tireless run were magnificent. It placed Iwobi in a position where he was mostly ineffective in our midfield and became the food for trolls. Chukwueze , Moses Simon , Lookman perfemored decently.

Osimhen was the star boy, and I dare say that after his two missed chances against Equatorial Guinea, where we played our most dominant game, let's not forget when we say the coach is ultradefensive that he didn't start the tournament that way, but realized the enormous mistake he might make if he didn't make such adjustment to suit Osimhen.

Iwobi's two creative passes to Osimhen were squandered by Osimhen in our opening game in AFCON. In subsequent games Iwobi is forced to sit deeper with Onyeka killing his creativity for the good of the game.
If Osimhen had converted those chances , we might have been sure that we have a constant scorer who will go on to achieve the highest goal scorer like Jude Ighalo did in 2019 under Gernot Rohr. Rohr is a much more defensive manager.

Take nothing away from the ruggedness of Osimhen winning penalties and all, but should Lookman possess just similar skills like Osimhen then we are doomed for exit. Thankfully we had a manager who controlled his game well and understood his team well. That AFCON tournament in Ivory coast had no forgiveness. Egypt, Ghana, Morocco, Ivory coast were àll beaten by minnows.

If Osimhen had the goals in the last AFCON I dare say he probably will not be playing at Galatasaray right now.

Ighalo was brought over to Manchester united by Ole Solsjaer simply because of his exploit at the 2019 AFCON where he was top scorer.

It only took Rohr one match to change his first choice striker from Onuachu to Ighalo in the match against Burundi at 2019. Though Osimhen will later score the equalizer through a Lookman lob as we settled for a draw. But that was enough to make the coach switch up to allow Osimhen play to his rugged strength and give room for Lookman to run behind him and do the finishing.

EEGA:
Tolu Arokodare scores against Osimhen's former club Sporting Charleroi.

Can we see this guy in our next FIFA window?

No. Tolu can't even lace Onuachu's boots in Belgium.
He is only there based on Onuachu's godlike performance if not he could still have been playing in the second division of France.

He is not as prolific as Onuachu was in Belgium. Believe me, we need people who can improve our squad. Players who will come in 70th or 80th minutes and can turn games around. Players who carry a significant X factor.

My only recommendations will have been Gift Orban . But that one too seems to have lost focus. If we can't find any in that significant regards. Let's stick our guns with the likes of Kelechi Iheanacho who adds significant experience to the team

When I say our football has declined since the 90s. Look the way Morocco is whipping Lesotho right now.

BankyGee:
See wetin I just dey talk today. Our world ranking is in the mud, this loss dey definitely throway us go 40th or even 42nd seff 😡🤧

Morocco dey use first squad play dead-rubber games, dey win Lesotho 5–0 currently at 47 minutes.
Same Lesotho wey we draw 1–1 for WCQ last year 😭

Forget world ranking. Them no dey take am collect money for world bank

PDPGuy:
Remember, if CAS overturns CAF’s verdict on the botched Libya v Nigeria match, then we would have to get at least a draw vs Libya in the potentially rescheduled game…

Aah! so the libyan FA went to appeal at CAS🤣🤣

Cyriel Dessier coming in now for Boniface will carry more "X-factor" than Umar Sadiq.
That's why having to call up right players means a whole lot

Goke7:
Carelessness is the word, both the players and the coaches should take responsibility.

The foreign coach advocates will be back.

It's only natural that foreign coach advocates will talk. Barring Eguavone's first match against Benin which he won 3 nil. Every other games have been a struggle. We couldn't beat Rwanda away, we scraped past Libya , we drew Benin on a neutral ground and here we are struggling at home to Rwanda again. How different will it be for the world cup where we now need an almost perfect result to qualify .

I sincerely doubt we could have beaten Libya on their home if we had played the match. Judging by all this results

zicky:
ena dy talk oh, make iheanacho create for himself, still be the one to shoot. Nawao

Chukwueze did it

Gernot Rohr right now 🤣😭🤣😭🤣😭🤣😭🤣🤣🤣

Rwanda will be more aggressive this second half. Perhaps with chukwueze in, we can score from a counter.

TheSuperNerd:
I thought you said he was better than the other two. Who brought Nacho into play for that strike? Watch the game. Leave sentiment.

Yeah.

Samueltemi337:
See the Iheanacho way them say dey anonymous

If not Moses Simon running to create that for him, Iheanacho cannot create such . And even when he shot the ball did he score. He was so hyped that after that play, he ballooned the ball over the bar.

ChrisKels:
Our 013 U17 squad was fire, but our 015 set has given us more quality talents. That 015, (including the dropped players) currently has 3 good players in the super eagles today in Osimhen, Chuks and Osho, and we should not also forget that Nwakali got some caps too

From 2013 set , we had Ndidi who failed MRI , kelechi Iheanacho, Taiwo Awoniyi, Uzoho, Isaac Success. All played for the national team.

The 2013 teams still supercedes the 2015 for me

Not forgetting Saviour Godwin and Dele Alampasu

Kog45:
Kenya are not minnow in the 80s,in fact they made Afcon 88 and i do not think Yekini had any goal against Madagascar, Comoros, Lesotho, CAR, Equitorial Guinea and Rwanda cuz it was not easy then in the 80s for these teams to face bigger teams due to strictly CAF features.

A well widespreads features would have seen Yekini scoring more than 37 goals but anyhow Osimhen is going to beat that record with ease.

South Africa came into the party late in 1991 due to aparthied but fast forward they won Afcon 96,meaning they are not amateurs....yes we beat SA, 4-0 in Lagos but return leg was war and it ended 1-1

Exactly what I'm saying. How dare teams like Cape Verde, Mauritania, CAR , Sao Tome (not yet), make their debut in AFCON in the 90. This counties weren't playing Nigeria back then. They get knocked out before they play Nigeria for AFCON qualifiers when we had four groups.

Our standards dropped. We suddenly missed out of the AFCON in 2012, only for us to return with Keshi in 2013and win it, then we will miss out again in 2015 where Ivory coast defeated Ghana on penalties, and 2017 where Cameroon defeated Salah's Egypt in the finals

It's almost like Ghana saying no minnows again. I think Ghanaian football has also dipped, but we are way better . The only time they had it recently was qualifying ahead of us for the word cup, which was solely not because they were a better team but rivalry football which is not determined by form.

minfelix:
Yes i agree, but note one thing these guys may be minnows but wont wanna keep living in those name tag “minnow”
comoros ousted Ghana from the afcon, CAR has beaten many top countries(Algeria,Egypt,Nigeria).
Lesotho waking up…in the next 10/15yrs teams like sao tome, south sudan,Erithrea,mauritius will also start proving a point.

There is so much imbalance in that idea of minnows. The era we had minnows was when we will win the Olympics football, AFCON ,play at our first world cup and give a solid impression.
We won two super teams in Brazil and Argentina on our road to Olympics in a dramatic style. We were able to match traditional football nations. Now someone says no minnows, because we can't beat poorer African nations handsomely. I think we are rather on the decline and not the way round. We have struggled with any consistency 5 year plan.

Who saw how Bruno switched to the midfield and iwobi moved far left, Bruno brought in a special style in that midfield. He will later interpass with iwobi to deliver a beautiful cross to Osimhen.

Subzerooo:
I don’t see the use of Iheanacho if Iwobi will play in a two man midfield, Moses Simon can atleast fill up the space left by Iwobi if he is drawn towards the 18 yard box, Iheanacho is just useless

Inheanacho can as well play from there too. I believe they are trying to exploit Iheanacho's wing since they know all eyes will be on Lookman. Iheanacho can assist from there, he can pull out a screamer, he can as well interchange positions with iwobi , when it's a counter for us.

Subzerooo:
Wait, when did Okoye become our first choice

He said his list was based on his feelings.
It's not your own feelings

Ppogbae:
Yeah, he needs to leave soon cause he is levels above the competition there

Naso una go talk now, e go enter the boy head make e dey give club way rescue am last minute red flag behavior. When the right club comes, and it is just right for him to move, there wouldn't be too many rumors like he had the last time. It will be done quietly, amicably and professionally.

If no other team comes, he should enjoy his reign in turkey and if turkey becomes too difficult and the Saudis come, he should move there quietly. He seems to enjoy a large fan base in Nigeria, as long as he keeps contributing his quota when called upon he is good to go. And if tomorrow Nigeria has another great striker who can usurp Osimhen such is life. After all he has said it that super eagles no be for him papa. People come and people go.

Okoye is still a shaky keeper. He is good as our second choice .