Nigerian born- former Hungary youth international has sealed a season long loan switch to Turkish Super Lig side Kasimpasa from Dutch side Heerenveen, the club have announced.

Owngoalnigeria.com has reported his medicals two days back with Kasimpasa, and the hard tackling defender will now replace Nigerian international Kenneth Omeruo who returned back to Chelsea, after the expiration of his loan deal.

His deal to Kasimpasa has an option for the Turkish side to make the deal permanent next summer based on his performances in the blue and white jersey of Kasimpasa.

23 year old Otigba has 88 top flight league games experience, all achieved while playing for Heerenveen in the Dutch Eredivisie. Although he has represented Hungary at youth level he has long voice out his desire to represent Nigeria at senior level.

Chidozie Awaziem remarkable 18 months in Portugal has been crowned by FC Porto listing him in their 2016/2017 UEFA Champions League squad.

19 year old Awaziem who signed fresh terms with the Portuguese giants last season rose to the first team of FC Porto, after just six months at the Estadio Dragao following his strong showings for the B team.

Awaziem got his first team breakthrough during the second half of last season and ended the season with a total of 13 appearances for the first team.

The highly rated teen defender already has one appearance to his name this season, after starring for the B team in their season opener against Desportivo Aves.

Known for his firmness in tackles and aerial abilities, he ended last season with a goal to his name in a Cup game against Gil Vicente in addition to the two he scored for the B team who emerged champions of the second division.

Former Nigeria Under-20 striker Kehinde Fatai who presently holds a Romanian passport has joined Russian side FK Ufa, Owngoalnigeria.com can exclusively report.

The Sparta Praha forward has already agreed a deal with the Russian side and also had his medical yesterday. An official announcement of the deal is set to be made by Ufa before the end of today or tomorrow.

Since moving to Europe in 2009, shortly after starring for Nigeria at the Under-20 World Cup in 2009, he has played in Romania, Belgium and Czech Republic with his best stints coming during his time in Romania.

26 year old Fatai was stopped by FIFA from representing Romania when he was granted citizenship by the European country two year ago, as his switch fell outside the football governing body rules on switching of nationality.

He has a career league goal of 57 from 171 games in Europe for the various teams he has starred for namely, Farul Constanta,Astra,Club Brugge and Sparta Praha.

At Ufa he will team up with fringe Super Eagles midfielder Slyvester Igboun, who joined the Stadion Neftyanik outfit last summer.

Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola has settled for the trio of Nolito, Sergio Kun Aguero and Nigerian teen Kelechi Iheanacho as his top three striker for the season, Owngoalnigeria.com understands.

The trio were named by the manager in his initial UEFA Champions League squad for the two legged qualifiers against Steau Bucuresti of Romania, with Ivorian forward Wilfred Bony missing from the list.

Iheanacho,19, will most likely be the team third choice striker with Nolito and Aguero favoured ahead of the Nigerian, as witnessed in their 2-3 loss to Arsenal in a pre season game played on Sunday, where the Nigerian came on as a substitute to score City’s second goal of the game.

Aside Wilfred Bony, French midfielder Samir Nasri was also not given a look in by Guardiola who named new signing Leroy Sane in the squad for the game.

However the biggest controversy in the list was Everton defender John Stones who was named by the Manchester City manager despite the fact that his transfer is yet to be made official.

Even though he has been officially annouced in some quarters as the new coach of the Super Eagles of Nigeria, German Coach Gernot Rohr says he is yet to accept the terms proposed to him by the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF).

63 year old Rohr was officially named by the NFF as the Technical Adviser designate of the Super Eagles, after a meeting with the Technical Committee of the country’s football governing body.

However, it appears just like the case of when Frenchman Paul Le Guen denied accepting to coach Nigeria after he was announced as coach by the NFF, it looks like same is about to happen with German Rohr.

The former Burkina Faso manager was initially billed to watch the Nigeria Professional Football League game between Ikorodu United and Shooting Stars on Sunday, but refused to as it would mean he has officially start work in Nigeria.

As at the time of filing in this report, the German who is based in France, was getting set to return back to his base without signing the deal, hence postponing indefinitely his planned unveiling by the NFF earlier scheduled for today.

” I have not sign to coach Nigeria, we still have issues to iron out regarding terms of the contract, anything can still happen” He said to Owngoalnigeria.com German contact Jon Eberl.

Turkish Super lig outfit Caykur Rizespor have added another Nigerian to their rooster following the signing of Nigeria Under-23 invitee Atiemwen Iyayi Believe.

20 year old Iyayi joins the top division side from second division team Kayseri Erciyesspor,where he spent just six months following his transfer in January.

The former Bendel Insurance midfield maestro had a short stint in Cyprus before moving to Turkey and January. He was a part of the Nigeria Olympic team that defeated Brazil 1-0 in a friendly game played in Rio at the start of the year.

He will team up with Super Eagles defender Godfrey Obaboana at his new team to add creativity to their midfield ahead of the start of the Turkish league.

Iyayi although comfortable as a midfielder can also play from the flanks or behind the main striker, as evident in the game he played for the Nigeria Under-23s against Brazil.

19 year old Roma forward Sadiq Umar has won the hearts of so many Nigerians with his impressive performances for the Nigeria Under-23s at the ongoing Rio 2016 Olympics.

Umar has two goals from Nigeria’s two opening games of the tournament, which has lead to questions about how and when he was snapped up by Roma.

Here’s 13 facts you need to know about the young striker…

1. Sadiq was born in Kaduna, the state capital of Kaduna State in north-western Nigeria.

2. Although he is nicknamed “New Kanu” by the press in Nigeria, he is however known as “Jololo” in Kaduna where he grew up due to his lanky nature and languid style of play while growing up.

3. His late father Umar Abubakar was a former player of local Kaduna side, Ranchers Bees and is well known around Kaduna as “MEGA” until he passed away last month.

4. 19 year old Sadiq, stands at an impressive height of 6 foot,four inches (1.92m).

5. Sadiq started his career at Future of Africa Academy in Kaduna before moving to Football College Abuja, where he was spotted by Serie B side Spezia.

6. Sadiq finished as top scorer in the Primavera in his first season at Spezia- scoring 14 goals in his first 18 Primavera games but ended the season with 23 goals from 21 games.

7. He joined Roma on a season long loan deal last summer and the Serie A side exercised the option of making his contract permanent this summer for a fee reportedly in the region of £2.5m.

8. He made his first team debut for Roma in the Serie A clash against Bologna, replacing Juan Iturbe with two minutes left to play in the 2-2 away draw.

9. He has two goals from six Serie A games for Roma, scoring in the 3-3 draw against Chievo and the 2-0 win over Genoa.

10. He has however found games hard to come by since Rudi Garcia was replaced by Luciano Spalleti, with just one minutes of Serie A football since January the 24th of January 2016.

11. He ended up the season for the Primavera side of Roma with 23 goals in all competitions with 18 coming in the league and five in the UEFA Youth League.

12. Despite spending just over a year in Italy, he speaks, reads and understand Italian fluently, which is surprising considering he didn’t go beyond secondary school in Nigeria.

13.His closest friend till date still remains his childhood friend Nura Abdullahi, a right back who happens to be his teammate at everywhere he has played even at Roma, but he is presently injured.

Manchester City forward Kelechi Iheanacho has sent his get well messages to Arsenal defender Gabriel Paulista, due to his involvement in the clash that got the Brazilian injured in City’s 2-3 loss to Arsenal in their final pre season game.

Iheanacho who scored City’s second goal of the game after evading the Brazilian to head home, was involved in a tackle in the dying minutes of the game which resulted in what looks like a serious injury to the Arsenal defender.

” I didn’t touch him, he rolled over his ankle after the tackle. Still I told him sorry when he was about to be taken off, it’s not a nice sight seeing a fellow professional leaving the pitch in pain and on a stretcher. I wish him speedy recovery” Iheanacho told Owngoalnigeria.com after the game.

Speaking ahead of City’s first Premiership game next weekend, the 19 year old says his team are at the required fitness level ahead of the start of the season.

” We are ready, our fitness have moved up tremendously and we are now slowly getting used to the way the manager wants us to play. We still have few days before the start of the season to eradicate some of the flaws the manager has noticed, hopefully before our first game next weekend”.

Manager of Arsenal Arsene Wenger, has branded the tackle made by Nigeria international Kelechi Iheanacho on Arsenal defender Gabriel Paulista in the Gunners 3-2 win over Manchester City as stupid.

Paulista collided with Iheanacho in the dying seconds of the friendly tie, played in Sweden and came off worst and although the extent of the damage he suffered in the tackle is not yet known, it appears he might be out for a considerable length of time.

Reacting to the tackle, Wenger refused insinuations that it was an accident, insisting that the tackle shouldn’t have been made in the first place by Iheanacho.

“I’ve never seen an intelligent accident, they always look stupid. We have to take that. He played the ball 100 per cent and I think he rolled his ankle, but I don’t know how it happened. It’s part of our game” He said

The Nigeria Under-23s are through to the knock out round of the Rio 2016 Olympics courtesy of a 1-0 win over Sweden thanks to a headed goal from Sadiq Umar.

Owngoalnigeria.com rates the player on show for Nigeria.

Emmanuel Daniel: Just like the first half, had nothing at all to do between the sticks for Nigeria, didn’t make a single save as Sweden didn’t do anything meaningful in the Nigerian goal area….7/10

Shehu Abdullahi: Joined the attack more in the second half, linked up well with Ezekiel. His ability to defend and attack in equal measures is a plus to the Nigerian team….7/10

Stanley Amuzie: Very good going forward and provided the assist for Umar, provided more of the same in the second half but still remained suspect when he needed to defend….6.5/10

Sincere Seth: Improved on his first half performance with some nice interceptions and coverage for the full backs, appears to be forging an understanding with Ekong in central defence….6/10

William Troost Ekong: Solid showing from the former Dutch youth international, you can’t fault his desire and he stepped it up with a commanding display in the second half ….7/10

Azubuike Okechukwu: Provides the stamina, does the dirty job and happy to play deep, allowing the likes of Mikel and Usman play ahead of him, was his usual self, although had a better second half ….7/10

Mikel Obi: The ease at which he has settled into his childhood role of playing as an attacking midfielder, has once again raised debates about if his move to Chelsea was the right move, came close to scoring twice and put in a very good shift until he was substituted ….7.5/10

Usman Mohammed: Salient achiever in the middle for Nigeria, kept the shape of the team with quick passes to set up attacks, knows when to play it simple or otherwise….7/10

Imoh Ezekiel: Livewire of the Nigerian team in attack, never scared of running at defenders, has pace to burn and also did a good job defensively as well, badly in need of a goal to crown his efforts so far….7.5/10

Ogenekaro Etebo: Had more shots on target than any other player on the pitch, unlucky not to get on the score sheet but as usual made his presence known with some strong energetic runs….6.5/10

Sadiq Umar: Got a rousing applause upon his substitution, a sign of how well he played, his goal won it for Nigeria and deservedly so as it secures progression to the next round…8.5/10

Substitutes:

Aminu Umar: Picked up a needless booking from a poorly timed tackle, didn’t play between the lines like the man he replaced Sadiq Umar and for the minutes he was on failed to get on same wavelength with his teammates….4/10

Kingsley Madu: Was brought on to aid Amuzie in defending but did very little defensively and offensively was wasteful when he had the ball….3/10

Ndifreke Udo: Slotted in perfectly at right back for Shehu Abdullahi, didn’t do much in terms of attacking but got the job done….5/10