Nigeria's Under-17, the Golden Eaglets would be going for nothing but victory when they face the Junior Leopards of Congo Democratic Republic in an African U-17 Championship on Saturday in Kinshasa.
This much was said by the team's Head Coach, Emmanuel Amuneke(MON) after the team's final training session on Friday ahead of the match fixed for
3:30pm local time( 3:30pm Nigerian time) at the Tata Raphael Stadium.
" We are here to win and it is as simple as that but we know that the game would not be as simple as that," said Amuneke who scored match-winning goals when Nigeria won the 1994 African Cup of Nations and Atlanta'96 Olympic Soccer Gold medal.
"We have constantly told the boys that all what we had done in the past are now in the past and the moment of serious business is here for us."
Keen followers of the team could readily predict the team's line up after remarkably playing 21 matches undefeated in regulation time (bar the penalty shoot-out loss to Benin at the WAFU B Tournament in Togo) fueling suspicion that the 1994 African Footballer of the Year might stick with his reliable against Congo DR.
"The only difference between Saturday's match and the ones we had played in the past is just the circumstance because this is one of the qualifiers for Niger," he explained. "So it is important for us to win irrespective of what Congo would throw at us because we know Kinshasa is a difficult place to win matches."
Typically, Amuneke refrained from picking any particular player as the joker for the match saying that all the 18 players on the trip are physically and psychologically ready for what is regarded within the rank of the team as 'The Battle of Kinshasa.'
"Joker? I don't have any joker for the match," he bluntly said. "What we have is a team with winning mentality and we have brought players we believe would do the job for us."
This much was said by the team's Head Coach, Emmanuel Amuneke(MON) after the team's final training session on Friday ahead of the match fixed for
3:30pm local time( 3:30pm Nigerian time) at the Tata Raphael Stadium.
" We are here to win and it is as simple as that but we know that the game would not be as simple as that," said Amuneke who scored match-winning goals when Nigeria won the 1994 African Cup of Nations and Atlanta'96 Olympic Soccer Gold medal.
"We have constantly told the boys that all what we had done in the past are now in the past and the moment of serious business is here for us."
Keen followers of the team could readily predict the team's line up after remarkably playing 21 matches undefeated in regulation time (bar the penalty shoot-out loss to Benin at the WAFU B Tournament in Togo) fueling suspicion that the 1994 African Footballer of the Year might stick with his reliable against Congo DR.
"The only difference between Saturday's match and the ones we had played in the past is just the circumstance because this is one of the qualifiers for Niger," he explained. "So it is important for us to win irrespective of what Congo would throw at us because we know Kinshasa is a difficult place to win matches."
Typically, Amuneke refrained from picking any particular player as the joker for the match saying that all the 18 players on the trip are physically and psychologically ready for what is regarded within the rank of the team as 'The Battle of Kinshasa.'
"Joker? I don't have any joker for the match," he bluntly said. "What we have is a team with winning mentality and we have brought players we believe would do the job for us."
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