Sports
Ughelli Pre-Season Cup Semi-Finals Hold, Today
Semi Final matches of the 11th edition of the Ughelli. Pre-Season Cup competition hold today with Go-Round FC of Omoku and Goddosky FC of Nnewi at the Ughelli Township Stadium, Delta State.
T Amako FC of Warri and Excellent FC of Ughelli are among teams to play in the Semi-finals encounter. The tournament which started Sunday, January 15 is expected to end tomorrow.
According to the organiser of the competition, Coach Onome James, the competition so far has been good, as teams have displayed high levels of discipline and understanding, saying that this year’s edition was a huge success.
“I will rate it 85%. We expected more than eight league teams but due to the Nigeria National League (NNL) which is expected to kick off 30th January, also, most teams did not turn up for financial reasons, but this year’s Ughelli Pre-Season Cup was a great success,” he noted.
He said the competition had just discovered a young talent, Emmanuel Peters, who is 16 years and from Team, Ivory Coast. whom he described as a fantastic attacking midfielder was discovered during the competition.
“We have discovered a few talents during the tournament, Emmanuel Peters is one of them, he is good at what he does, he is a fantastic attacking midfielder and will do better in the future if well groomed,” Coach James added.
The competition is played to immortalised Late Prince Anthony Obaseki, one of the finest sports journalists of his times and a publicity officer of the Ughelli Pre-Season Cup.
The aim of the Ughelli Pre-Season tournament is for the Nigeria National League (NNL) and Nigeria Nation Wide (NLO) Clubs prepare themselves ahead of the up-coming (NNL) and (NLO) 2021 leagues season.
Winners and runners up are to cart away the sum of N150,000 and N100,000 respectively.
By: Nancy Briggs
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.