Chelsea mercurial midfielder John Obi Mikel is back at the club, after his mercurial display at the Olympics in Rio that helped Nigeria to a bronze medal finish.

Mikel will however not be available for selection in Chelsea’s next three games as he has been granted extended leave by Italian manager Antonio Conte due to his involvement at the Olympics.

” Mikel will arrive England today by the grace of God, but he won’t be available for selection at least for the next three games, he has been handed an extended break to help him recover from the exhaustion of the Olympics” a source close to the player told Owngoalnigeria.com.

The Super Eagles captain will however honour the invitation extended to him by newly appointed Super Eagles coach Genort Rohr for the dead rubber tie against Tanzania next month in Uyo despite the fact that his holiday would still be on.

” He will be in Nigeria for the Tanzania tie, he is the captain and there is a new coach, if not for anything, he need to meer with the coach to hear from him his plans regarding the way forward for the Super Eagles”.

Goalkepper of the bronze winning Nigeria Olympic men football team, Emmanuel Daniel says reports linking him with a move to Everton are wide off the mark.

Reports came out in the Nigerian press this morning citing English Premiership side Everton, as one of the teams interested in the services of the shot stopper who performed admirably well for Nigeria at the Olympics.

” (Laughs), what will one not hear from the Nigeria press? my brother I wish it’s true but to the best of my knowledge, nothing like that” He told Owngoalnigeria.com.

However when Owngoalnigeria sort to know more from the Enugu Rangers man regarding a move to Israel, the Kaduna born goalkepper failed to deny or confirm interest in his services from the country.

” Israel, let’s wait and see, in the coming days I will get a clear picture regarding my next move but for now am a player of Enugu Rangers, and if any change happen, the world will know”.

A close friend to Super Eagles and Leicester City forward Ahmed Musa says Mark Clattenburg, the referee who denied the 23 year old a stone wall penalty claim against Arsenal had a chat with him after the game.

Musa was clipped from behind by Arsenal defender Hector Bellerin in the box, after using his pace and trickery to leave the Spaniard in his wake.

However Clattenburg waved play on, but video replays showed the forward was indeed tripped by the Arsenal man, which in a way made the referee to have a word with the Nigerian,

” We spoke about the penalty incident and he confirmed the referee had a chat with him in the dressing room over it, it’s unfortunate it wasn’t given but then again such things happen in football” a national team colleague of the forward told Owngoalnigeria.com.

*Picture credit: skysports

The Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) have alleged that Africa football governing body CAF, are working against Nigeria’s progress at youth level due to their dominace the last few years.

Nigeria have won the last two editions of the U-17 World Youth Championship, but won’t be defending her trophy in India after they were knocked out by Niger Republic on a 2-3 aggregate score.

The manner of the loss suffered by the U17s in Niamey have made the football body in Nigeria to allege a grand conspiracy against them, because a similar incident stopped the U20s from next year Africa Youth Championship.

” We are convinced there’s a deliberate attempt to stop our dominance in youth football in Africa and the world at large. You need to see at the type of treatment and officiating we were subjected to in Niamey to agree with me”, a bigwig of the NFF told Owngoalnigeria.com.

” Right here in Lagos, the Flying Eagles were robbed against Sudan, ironically same referee was put in charge of the U17s first game against Niger in Abuja, again the world saw what happened.

” We have forwarded a protest to CAF to let them know we are aware of all their planned attempt to stifle us. We smelt a rat right from the MRI scan of the U17s, our fears were confirmed in Niger Republic.

Liverpool teen forward forward Taiwo Awoniyi, who is set to be sent on loan soon, is few details away from equaling Chelsea star John Obi Mikel national team record for Nigeria.

Mikel made history during the recently concluded Rio 2016 Olympics when he scored for the U-23s against Denmark, as he becomes the first Nigerian player to score for Nigeria at all levels.

The Chelsea star scored for Nigeria at the U-17 World Cup in Finland in 2003, and followed that up with another goal for the U-20 at the World Youth Championship in 2005, two years later in the Netherlands.

At senior level he scored at the his first cup of nation appearance in 2006 in a tie against Zimbabwe before finally making history at the Olympics with his goal against Denmark in the semi-final.

Awoniyi reportedly set to seal a loan switch to Dutch side NEC Nijmegen is the only other active Nigerian player who has scored for all the age grade teams bar the Super Eagles.

The 19 year old Awoniyi still has time on his side and pending on how he progress, he could be called up to the senior national team of Nigeria.

Enyimba FC of Aba striker Christian Obiazor has arrived Israel for talks with Isreali top division side Kiryat Shmona, Owngoalnigeria.com can exclusively reveal.

The power playing forward who has had an injury hit campaign this season, is widely regarded as one of the most feared strikers in the Nigeria Professional Football League (NPFL).

He will spend a week training with the team to prove his fitness, before a deal can be reached with Kiryat Shmona as he he has been out injured for a while.

Obiazor only returned to league action two weeks ago, since pulling up injured last season shortly after his transfer from Kano Pillars to Enyimba.

Locally, he has represented teams like Enugu Rangers, Kano Pillars and Enyimba and was a part of the Nigeria team to CHAN 2014.

Fans of English Premiership side Chelsea are of the opinion that, manager Antonio Conte should play Nigeria captain John Obi Mikel in an advanced role in midfield if he wants to get the best out of the 29 year old.

The cross section of fans made their views known on twitter during the men’s football event of the Rio 2016 Olympics, where the current Chelsea second longest serving player excelled in an advanced midfield role for Nigeria.

Mikel picked up five assist in the six games he played for Nigeria at the games,scoring once in the process and was involved in almost all of Nigeria’s forays into the box of their opponents.

Also after seeing him deliver a pin point cross from a corner kick for Aminu Umar to nod home against Denmark in the semi-finals, some of the club fans urged the manager to give him the right to take corner kicks and other set piece for the team.

He (Mikel) added his own opinion to the debate during an interview on FIFA.com, where he admitted to be more comfortable playing in an advanced role than his present deep seating role at Chelsea.

However, the Chelsea star said he is comfortable and willing to play in any role that will help the team achieve it’s goal.

The plans of the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) to hijack the cash gift given to the Nigeria Under-23, shortly after they won bronze at the Rio 2016 Olympics was foiled by captain of the Nigeria team John Obi Mikel.

A total of $390,000 was given to the bronze winning Nigeria team by Japanese surgeon Dr. Katsuya Takasu shortly after their 3-2 win over Honduras, but the NFF asked for the said amount to be given to the Federation which is presently battling financial crunch.

However, captain of the team Mikel foiled their plans by clearly telling them that any attempt to hijack the money from the team will make them boycott the tie against Honduras.

Officials of the NFF also failed in their attempts to make the Japanese philanthropist hand the money out to the Federation in cash, apparently after Mikel contacted him not to change his plans of handing out the money in cheque.

The cheque was written in the names of Mikel Obi and coach Samson Siasia, with Mikel in charge of distributing the money among the

AS Roma teen forward Sadiq Umar who scored a brace for Nigeria Olympic team, in their 3-2 win over Honduras to help them claim the bronze medal of the men’s football event of Rio 2016 Olympics, has revealed why he didn’t celebrate either of his goals.

19 year old Sadiq tapped in a Mikel Obi brilliant ball at the far post to give Nigeria the lead in the first half, and followed it up with another in the second half, when he received a pass from Mikel before wrong footing his marker then sliding home to put the scores at 3-0.

However, he didn’t celebrate any of the goals like he has done with his previous two strike during the course of the tournament, which he puts down to the disappointments of missing out on playing in the final.

” I was grateful to Allah for the goals but my joy was curtailed because am yet to get over the disappointment of not reaching the final, am yet to believe we won bronze” He told Owngoalnigeria.com.

“I promised my late dad at his grave that I will put in my best to win gold for his sake as he died few days before the start of the Olympics, that can also make you understand why I was so pained that we didn’t make it to the final”.