Super Eagles of Nigeria interim coach Austin Eguavoen has praised his playing contingent at the ongoing African Cup of Nations holding in Cameroon for finishing Group D with three wins.
The 56-year-old who equaled his record of three group stage wins by a Nigeria coach set at AFCON 2006 stated this moments after the Super Eagles defeated Guinea Bissau 2-0 at their Garoua base.
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In an interview with SuperSport, Eguavoen said the 100% record shows his team is strong and always aims to win.
“Obviously [the win shows that we are a strong group, you know every time we say we take it game after game, and we respect our opponents,” the NFF Technical Director started, “but we go full force to get the maximum points, that is the idea.
“The mission is first of all don’t lose the game, so turning out nine points from this group [that includes Egypt], I say a lot of credit goes to the boys because they put in a lot of effort.”
Eguavoen made eight changes to the team that defeated both Egypt and Sudan, but his team still won 2-0 and failed to convert several chances.
The coach, however, disclosed that the team will try to improve on its finishing touches going into the knockout stages, while any player within the group can influence matches.
“We always create chances, just to finish them off that is what we are going to work on. Now we can see that we have a team, more than 11 players. Anybody that is given a chance anytime can always play, we have a good group,” Eguavoen concluded.
In the same vein, Kelechi Iheanacho praised the impact of coach Eguavoen, stating that the appointment of the Tunisia 1994 AFCON winning defender has improved the team’s style of play.
“We have been strong in recent but I think the new identity in the national team is very important [to how the team became better], we know how to play and how to move between lines. So we got it, we got what we need and we need to carry on like that,” Iheanacho added.
Nigeria continues to await its opponent in the round of 16 stage at AFCON 2021.
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