The coach of the senior national team of Nigeria Jose Peseiro has penciled down three players of Nigerian descent plying their trade in England as part of the squad of players called up for the upcoming friendly game against Portugal.
Owngoalnigeria.com can exclusively reveal that Peseiro has already sent out preliminary invitation to players selected for the game, with a view of trimming it down to a sizeable number of 23 before camping resumes for the game, which will take place on the 17th of November.
We can confirm that Crystal Palace recently promoted goakeeper Owen Goodman, whose mother is close to the newly elected NFF president Ibrahim Musa Gusau made the shortlist. Already he has a Nigerian passport and he doesn’t need a clearance to play in the game.
Also Middlesbrough forward Chuba Akpom has been handed his first call up, five years after he trained with the senior national team of Nigeria in London when they held a training camp. Already he has gotten the all clear from FiFA since three years ago but wasn’t given a look in until now.
This season, the former England U21 forward who passed through the youth ranks at Arsenal and made some appearances for the first team has found the back of the net four times in nine games. He initially snubbed the choice of playing for Nigeria but he has since made a U-turn on that decision.
Another name in the mix is the captain of Blackpool Marvin Ekpiteta per what we gathered, the 27 year old who trained with the Nigeria U20 team of 2013 has been rock solid for the Championship new boys with two man of the match awards from 15 games.
The above mentioned three players are part of a pool of 32 players handed preliminary invitation. However it remains to be seen if they will be in the final list of 23 called up for the game.
