Eagles Fired Up, Guinea In Disarray

Nigeria’s Super Eagles will play host to their Guinean counterparts tomorrow in a must-win 2012 Africa Cup of Nations qualifying match at the National Stadium in Abuja.

The qualifying series in Group B has gone down to the wire with the Eagles locked in a fierce battle with the Syli Nationale of Guinea for the sole ticket to next year’s championship.

The song on the lips of the Eagles is: Guinea must fall. P.M.Sports gathered that the players are all fired up to ensure Nigeria get the ticket in tomorrow’s tie.

Granada CF of Spain striker, Ikechukwu Uche, said the Eagles are in the right frame of mind for the crucial match.

“I want to tell Nigerians that I and other Eagles players will give Nigerians the desired result.”

His elder brother, Kalu Uche said the Eagles have resolved that it is a must-win match. “Honestly, the spirits are very high in camp because everybody is ready to give their best tomorrow. We all know how important this match is and we are all ready to do our best to secure victory for Nigeria,” said the Neuchatel Xamas player.

Coach Samson Siasia, 44, is confident that his men can get the work done against the Guineans.

“We can’t afford not to beat Guinea. How do we tell Nigerians that we will not be playing at the Nations Cup next year?” he asked.

Meanwhile, the camp of Guinea has been thrown into disarray due to their coach’s inability to secure an entry visa from France into the country.

A top official of the Nigeria Football Federation, NFF, revealed that Michel Dussuyer was denied visa by the Nigerian Embassy in France, where the Guinean team trained before they set out for Nigeria on Thursday.

This has dealt a big blow to the ambition of the Guineans to stun the Eagles in Abuja as the coach is likely not to be on the bench when his players take on the Nigerian team tomorrow.

Aboubacar Titi Camara, Guinea’s Sports Minister, who is the leader of delegation to Nigeria, told BBC early today that “we are still in shock to know that we won’t be with our highly influential coach and the players can’t believe it either. It will be a great miss for the team and we are still hoping the situation will change; who knows.”

Assistant coach of the team, Morlaye Soumah also said they are battling to make sure the absence of the coach will not affect the performance of the players in the match.

He said: “There is no way we are not going to miss our coach because he has been the brain behind every success the team have achieved in the past one year. But I can assure you we will do all we can to make sure the effect is minimal and we’ll go out there tomorrow and play according to the plans we had in training.”

—Bamidele Olowosagba, Bimbo Ajayi & Olusegun Abidoye