Akwa Ibom Beat Osun In Football

The Akwa Ibom female football team on Wednesday defeated their Osun counterparts 4-1 in the Group B preliminaries of the ongoing 18th National Sports Festival.

Akwa-Ibom, grouped alongside Taraba, Osun, Benue and Enugu and are playing their matches at the Agege Stadium.

Akwa Ibom had led the game with two goals in the first half and scored two more in the first 15 minutes of the second half.

Osun, however, erased one of the goals when one of their players was brought down in their opponents’ goal area, resulting in a penalty that was converted.

Atta Bello Udia, coach of Team Akwa-Ibom, attributed his team’s victory to hard work and good preparation.

“’We are here for the gold medal. My team are fully prepared and determined to achieve our aim,’’ he said.

His Osun counterpart, Johnson Kehinde, expressed dissatisfaction over his team’s performance and promised to bounce back in their next match.

“I am not happy that we conceded four goals. We had chances but did not convert them to goals,’’ he said.

Osun had earlier won their first match against Benue 2-0 on 26 November and will play against Taraba in their next match on 30 November.

Akwa-Ibom also won their first match against Taraba 2-1 and will now meet Enugu.

In group A, the match between Kaduna and Adamawa was a walkover because Team Adamawa failed to show up.