Sports
Plateau United Wants Early Preparation
After leading the Peace Boys to the NPFL title, the tactician is hoping for an early start in plans for their continental campaign
Having clinched the Nigeria Professional Football League title with Plateau United, Kennedy Boboye is hoping for early preparation for next year’s CAF Champions League campaign.
A final day 2-0 win over Enugu Rangers confirmed the Peace Boys as Nigeria topflight champions at the Rwang Pam Stadium.
The former Sunshine Stars coach admitted that early planning helped his side record their league success, stressing that he is eager to maintain the feat to avoid a disastrous outing.
“I give thanks to God for helping me record a title success with Plateau United,” Boboye told Tidesports.
“I had the backing of the people of Plateau and Plateau State Government for giving me all the support. I’m happy to give back to them the trophy.
“It is one thing every coach wants in life. There is no coach that doesn’t want to win laurels if this is one thing I can add to my CV, I’m grateful to God.
“We want to start preparing the CAF Champions League. I think we need to learn from the mistakes of Enugu Rangers and others. We don’t need to go to sleep because this is when we should start working. Early preparation brings good results.
“Anybody that does not have my idea of what I want in the team won’t stay. We all had an agreement on how to play in every five games is to fight for 15 points, the least we must get is 13.”
“In Plateau United, I was never pressured at any point for anything. I asked for players and I got those I wanted and nobody tried to enforce any player on me. It is in my contract that nobody interferes in my job,” he added.
“Once you interfere, I will just call it a quit. I don’t think they will but give me the support to get quality players I’ve seen in the league and not those in other countries who does not know the Nigerian league.
“I have some players penciled down that i will be inviting in no time. We need to start negotiating with them, fight on securing their clearance in other to start working with them.”
Iwobi spoke to Tidesports source ahead of Nigeria’s crunch playoff semi-final against Gabon on Thursday, November 13, in Rabat, Morocco.
The 28-year-old was reacting to Nigeria’s shaky World Cup qualifying campaign that saw the Eagles finish second in Group C behind South Africa’s Bafana Bafana.
“We’ve managed to rescue ourselves from the dead,” Iwobi told Tidesports source.
We know we have the players and the abilities to compete against any other country in the world.”
The Fulham star pointed to Nigeria’s star power, highlighting African Footballer of the Year winners Ademola Lookman and Victor Osimhen as proof of the squad’s quality.
“We have last year’s African best player (Ademola Lookman), the year before that (Victor Osimhen),” he said.
“It’ll be a shame if we don’t make it, but we have a lot of confidence. We just have to prove it to ourselves.”
Nigeria’s path to the United States, Canada and Mexico has been turbulent, with two coaches departing during the early stages of qualifying before Éric Chelle steadied the ship to steer the Super Eagles into November’s CAF playoffs.
Four nations from the continent – Nigeria, Cameroon, DR Congo and Gabon – will vie for a solitary spot to compete in next March’s inter-confederation playoffs, with a view to joining the already nine qualified African nations at the Finals.
It would mark Iwobi’s second appearance at the World Cup Finals and the Super Eagles’ first since the 2018 edition of the competition.
Back then, Iwobi featured in all three games as Nigeria was knocked out in the group stage.
The Chief Executive Officer(CEO) and Publisher of the Atlantic Bell Online medium, Mr. Celestine Ogolo has advised sports writers in Nigeria to diversify in sports writing and not to concentrate on football reporting alone.
The Deputy National President of Sports Writers Association of Nigeria (SWAN) Mr. Bonny Nyong has expressed commitment to support sports development and move SWAN forward.