Efe Ambrose, Michael Eneramo Ginger Eagles Against Elephants

Michael Eneramo

Since the Super Eagles entered into Kaduna City last Thursday high profile officials of both the Federation and the state have been visiting the team to offer words of advise and encouragement. Among them, NFF Executive Committee member and Chairman of the Finance Committee, Hon Shehu Adamu, who was in all the team’s training sessions, Director Competitions, NFF, Dr Sanusi Mohammed and even
the Kaduna State Sports Commissioner.

Players were excited by the presence of these officials but their joy knew no bound when some of their own, Efe Ambrose of Scottish side, Celtics and Mike Eneramo, who plies his trade in the Turkish top flight visited to offer pump up the team’s morale ahead of Saturday’s game.
First to visit was Ambrose who was in the team’s camp for the better part of Wednesday. The Delta born, Kaduna boy drove into the team’s African Continental Hotel few minutes to noon, stayed with the team and technical crew till evening training time and even joined the team at the Ahmadu Bello Stadium for the evening session. Midway into the session, he told officials he was leaving because he had to attend the evening service of his church. “I have spoken to the players, some of whom were my teammates and they know what to do. I will be in the stadium on Saturday to cheer them to victory”, Efe declared as he drove out of the stadium complex.

On Friday by lunch time, Eneramo drove in to offer his support to his national teammates. Looking fit and trim, the Eagles striker waited patiently for the coaching crew led by Stephen Kweshi to come out of their rooms for obeisance, before he went straight to each players for felicitation and advise. “We can beat Cote D’Ivoire silly”, he quipped. Adding that with the caliber of players he has seen he was sure that Nigeria will triumph on Saturday.

Following general impression that the team has been creating plenty of chances and scoring few, the coaching crew in the Super Eagles have been working on all members of the team to perfect shooting and scoring strategies. Keshi said he expects the team to create plenty of chances hence the need to put them away and make the return leg in Abidjan a mere formality.
The Head Coach has also admonished players in the present Super Eagles setup to fight for their colleagues in the Glo Premier League so that more of them will be called up for national assignment. “In my days as a home based professional footballer, my colleagues from all over the country used to be proud of me because I represented them well. Do the same well and help restore the pride of the Nigerian based professional footballer.