Leicester City’s Kelechi Iheanacho, Union Berlin’s Taiwo Awoniyi, Henry Onyekuru of Olympiakos and Slavia Prague’s Peter Olayinka should forget about any return to the national team, the Super Eagles, if words from team handler Jose Peseiro is anything to go by.
Peseiro according to our source has ruled out inviting new players for September’s 2023 Africa Cup of Nations qualifier against Guinea Bissau as he expressed satisfaction with the team that demolished Sao Tome and Principe 10 -0 recently in Morocco.
Awoniyi, Iheanacho, Onyekuru and Olayinka have been ignored since the Portuguese manager took charge of the team, and it may remain so in the future except the players’ performance improved tremendously.
The 62-year-old coach, who has consistently said he wants to focus on improving his team ahead of their 2023 AFCON tournament in Cote d’Ivoire is taking no prisoners.
“The players in the team at the moment are the best we have. I have watched a lot of videos and what they need to understand is our ideas and philosophy,” the Portuguese coach said last weekend.
Peseiro etched his name in the Nigerian football folklore with the biggest win in history when they decimated Sao Tome and Principe 10-0 in a 2023 AFCON qualifying match, surpassing a 10-1 triumph over Benin in 1959, and he says there won’t be any need for new legs in the team except the unexpected happens.
“New players spring up every day in Nigeria but we have the best now. Okay, if I see a new player who is doing better than the player in his position. I will give him time little by little to help him understand our idea which is what we want to do more at the moment and not bring in new players.”
