27th January, 2014
Former Flying Eagles coach, Paul Hamilton and ex-Super Eagles winger, Garba Lawal have warned the home-based Eagles not to allow their Ghanaian counterparts to score before them when they trade tackles on Wednesday in the semi final of the ongoing 2014 African Nations Championship, CHAN, holding in South Africa.
The Nigerian team, coached by Stephen Keshi, came back from a three goals deficit in their quarter final match against Morocco on Saturday to book a semi final ticket against Ghana that pipped DR Congo 1-0 on Sunday.
Hamilton said the semifinal match will turn out to be the most unpredictable game of the entire matches played so far by the Eagles at the championship, adding that the Nigerian team cannot afford to allow their opponents to score first as they did against the Atlas Lions of Morocco.
“We must not for any reason trail the Ghanaians as it may prove too tough to come back as we did against the Moroccans.
“And once we go up scoring we must not stop scoring, until the whistle sounds signifying the end of the encounter the Ghanaian side remain a dangerous side. Only goals win the match so we must continue to score goals,” said the former Super Falcons manager.
Lawal urged the Nigerian team not to allow loss of concentration to affect them. He said: “Our problem in most of the matches we have played so far is lack of concentration on the part of the team. Our boys need to play as a team and make sure they concentrate through out when they play Ghana on Wednesday.”