Eaglets get cash boost to beat Gabon

A good hearted Libreville-based Nigerian businessman, Chief George Uche, has offered a handsome cash reward to the Golden Eaglets if they win next weekend’s African Under-17 Championship finale qualifying match against Gabon.

Uche, who owns a thriving freight business in the Gabonese capital, said he was impressed with the performance of the team despite the odds placed before them before their 1-2 loss to Gabon on Sunday, hence the reason behind the dinner reception he hosted before their departure.

Apart from doling out $500 to the players, Uche has pledged the sum of One Million French Francs (about N300,000) to the team should they make good their promise to beat Gabon and pick one of the tickets to Niger 2015 Championship.

Prince Udofia, Golden Eaglets’ Coordinator commended Uche’s magnanimity while calling on eminent Nigerians as well as Corporate Nigeria to rally behind the team in their quest to qualify for the CAN championship.

“Chief Uche has really done well and we want to thank him from the bottom of our heart. This is an exemplary conduct and we want to believe this would ginger other well-to-do Nigerians to motivate the players in the crucial game against Gabon.

“This is an opportunity to remind Nigerians that the Under-17 team are defending World champions and they can only defend the trophy by first qualifying for the tournament in Niger as such this is the time to motivate the players,” he noted.

Meanwhile, Golden Eaglets’ captain, Kelechi Nwakali and defender Lukman Halilu have been recounting their ordeal in the hands of the Gabonese, saying the nasty experience would only emboldened them for the second leg cracker.

The duo who kept a separate diary of events during their laborious journey from Lagos to Libreville noted the unsporting conduct of their hosts, but are however hopeful that their counterparts from Gabon would meet their waterloo on the pitch in Calabar.

Halilu said: “The journey from Lagos to Libreville was stressful and we were not happy the way we were treated in Lome when we were ordered out of the flight even after checking in and collecting our board pass because we were told the Gabonese did not want us to come for the match.

“Even on getting to Libreville, we were warned not to even eat their food because of their hostile nature which we later saw on match day.

“The match was not in our favour to the extent that we were robbed because of the bad officiating by the referee and we are equally shocked when the fans started shouting at us and calling us ‘Ebola Nigeria! Ebola Nigeria!!’

“All through our stay in Libreville, I usually remember what coach Emmanuel Amuneke was telling us right from the screening that ‘this journey is not going to be easy’ and our experiences in Libreville gave us idea about what he meant.”

Yet Nwakali believes the Golden Eaglets have put the nightmarish experience behind them as they turn attention to the second leg.

“We are going to show Gabon that Nigeria are the Under-17 defending champions and not ‘Ebola Nigeria’ as they called us in Libreville,” Nwakali said in his usual joking manner.