The Super Eagles head coach, Jose Peseiro, has expressed confidence that the Nigerian national team will emerge victorious against the Desert Foxes of Algeria when both teams clash on Tuesday in an international friendly.
The Super Eagles and the Desert Foxes will rekindle their age-old rivalry on Tuesday when they clash at the Miloud Hadefi Stadium, in Oran.
The game is scheduled to get underway at 8 p.m. Nigerian time.
Nigeria head into Tuesday’s match seeking to end a run of three games without a win against the North Africans.
And Pesiero is confident the winless streak against the Algerians could end when both teams meet on Tuesday night.
“We trained well; we have been trying to introduce some new dynamics, some new methods that will be good for our team. The players have adapted well. The players have adapted well both on and off the pitch,” Peseiro said in an interview with NFF TV.
“We are going to play against a good team. It won’t be easy, but we have the quality. We will fight hard to beat them,” he added.
Quizzed about the injured players such as William Troost-Ekong, Victor Osimhen, Samuel Chukwueze, and Wilfred Ndidi and how much of a miss they will be in Tuesday’s game, Peseiro said the team has enough quality players to fill in for the injured ones.
The game against Algeria was going to be Ndidi’s first appearance for Nigeria since the conclusion of the Africa Cup of Nations in Cameroon but the Leicester City midfielder was forced to pull out of Tuesday’s friendly after “feeling something” in his hamstrings.
Scan results have since shown that Ndidi only suffered a grade one tear which is expected to see him return to action in the coming days.
Ndidi had been rumoured to have argued with the Super Eagles coach over his role on the pitch but the Portuguese-born coach was quick to dismiss such claims.
“He came, he trained without intensity, a small training [session]. He feels something in his hamstring, and I think it’s best not to use [him]. It’s not dangerous but I’m not going to use one player in a friendly match if he can get more injured. He [returned] to Leicester for recovery,” Peseiro said.(The Guardian)
•PHOTO: Jose Peseiro
