As many as five players of the senior national team of Nigeria have backed the decision of Emmanuel Dennis not to hand the ball to William Troost Ekong despite instructions from the coach.

Nigeria won a penalty during the course of the 0-4 defeat to Portugal, Dennis was told to hand the ball to Ekong by Jose Peseiro but the former Watford man insisted on taking the spot kick with scores at 0-2. He ended up missing and Portugal went ahead to score two more goals within a space of two minutes.

Reacting to the incident, one of the players said it’s normal to have such kind of situation and it isn’t enough to crucify Dennis because any player could have also missed. ” It happens all the time. It’s unfortunate that he missed it but he is among one of our best penalty takers, so no problem with insisting on taking it”, he told OwnGoalNigeria.com.

Another player said, the entire issue is been blown out of proportion as they didn’t see it the way many took it. ” I’m not sure many people understood the essence of the game. It’s a friendly game and the incident is normal not the way it is being reported by the press”, he said.

A new player in the team also said the entire team didn’t fault Dennis because it wasn’t like he deliberately missed the penalty. ” He didn’t pick up the ball to miss. His intention was to score and it’s unfortunate he didn’t. I’m a new player in the team and I can tell you that not even one person faulted him. It’s normal”, he rounded up saying.

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What kind of soccer games can I play at online casinos?

There are very few soccer-themed games available at online casinos today. At many fully licensed online casinos, you can generally only find a handful of soccer-themed slots, plus one or two soccer-themed live dealer casino games (depending on which casino you sign up to). If you’re new to online slot machines and want more information about how they work, including how the average payout rates are calculated and, for example, how the different payline structures work in slots, you can find the slot machine lines explained in detail over at several trusted online casino review sites, such as Ask Gamblers.

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Things to remember when gambling for real money

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The coach of the senior national team of Nigeria Jose Peseiro has made up his mind on the future of five senior players in the team including captain of the team Ahmed Musa.

Peseiro has struggled to get results since his appointment as coach of the senior national team of Nigeria but that hasn’t stop him from making big decisions on some players, who don’t seem to fit into his plans.

We gathered he has decided to leave out captain of the team Ahmed Musa until his form improves at club level. Musa only recently joined another Turkish side Sivasspor from Fatih Karagamruk with the aim of getting regular run of games.

Since his move he has played just four matches although a fractured elbow kept him out of actions until the final round of games just before the World Cup break. He still wasn’t picked by Peseiro for the friendly game against Portugal.

Going forward, he might not get any chance to add to his 107 caps for Nigeria with the Portuguese as coach unless his form improves at club level. His treatment is however different from other senior players in the team owing to his role as the captain.

The quartet of Leon Balogun, Kenneth Omeruo, Kelechi Iheanacho and Shehu Abdullahi won’t be accorded same privilege as they don’t fit into the manager’s plan. He has other players ahead of them in the pecking order.

We gathered, the Portuguese coach wants to build his team around young and hungry players and see the phasing out of the aforementioned quartet as the first step toward achieving his goal before the Africa Cup of Nations in 2024.

The future of coach of the senior national team of Nigeria Jose Peseiro has been heavily debated since the 0-4 loss to Portugal in an international friendly game against Thursday.

Since his appointment six months ago, the Portuguese coach has only two wins to boast of and it came against Sierra Leone and Sao Tome and Principe. Two teams Nigeria were expected to beat.

In four friendly games as coach, the team has lost in all and the 0-4 defeat is the heaviest they have suffered the past ten years. More worrying is the fact that they don’t appear to be playing with the style promised by the coach when he was appointed.

Speaking on what led to his appointment as coach, a former member of the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) said when they interviewed coaches for the job, Peseiro came third in the interview but was given the job because his salary demand falls within the budget of the football house.

” He (Peseiro) wasn’t the best after the interview where we had Laurent Blanc, Philip Cocu and Ernesto Valverde under serious consideration but his demand was the one that suits our budget. I must admit we know he isn’t the best but he is the most affordable plus we already have an agreement with him which we didn’t honour previously. All those played a part in his appointment”, he told Owngoalnigeria.com in an exclusive chat.

The war of words between former Super Eagles coach Gernot Rohr and former president of the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) Amaju Pinnick has taken another twist few days to the start of the world cup.

Pinnick was the one who authorized the sacking of the German coach despite qualifying for the World Cup playoff after finishing as group leaders. Rohr was sacked three hours after the ticket for the play off was secured. He was later told to return to his post but with less than three weeks to the start of the Africa Cup of Nations, he was officially disengaged as coach.

Nigeria went to the AFCON and had one of their worst ever campaign at the tournament, exiting immediately after the group phase under interim coach Austine Eguavoen. Eguavoen was left at the helm for the World Cup playoff and after a 0-0 draw away to Ghana. They drew 1-1 in Abuja and Ghana secured a spot at the mundial on away goal rule.

Reacting to all that has happened to the country’s football since his exit, Rohr told local radio station Eagle FM that the former NFF president should be blamed for all that has happened, particularly missing out on qualification for the World Cup.

An angry Pinnick sent a message to the station which was made public by Osasu Obayiuwana, who conducted the interview. He accused the station of bias before firing a barb at Rohr saying he had sexcapedes with little girls while he was head coach.

“It is a shame when you trivialise or personalise issues. It makes your radio station very biased. Why didn’t Osasu ask Rohr about his countless sexcapades with little girls, Gabon, Burkina Faso and Niger?… Let him call me a criminal or defame in your station”, he said via text message as revealed by Osasu on his Twitter handle.

Former coach of the senior national team of Nigeria Gernot Rohr has arrived Qatar to begin his new job schedule for the period of the 2022 World Cup taking place in the Asian country.

Rohr lost his job as coach of the Nigerian team just before the World Cup qualifiers playoff. In his absence Austine Eguavoen failed to lead the team to the World Cup losing out on away goal rule to Ghana after a 1-1 draw in Abuja.

Despite Nigeria failing to make it to the World Cup, the German coach will be at the tournament as one of the analyst for French television channel, where his vast knowledge of African football will be needed for games involving teams from the continent.

OwnGoalNigeria.com exclusively gathered that he has already arrived in Qatar just in time for the opening ceremony and will be there until after the World Cup. He is yet to get a job since he was sacked by Nigeria. At the World Cup, he will speak on the five African teams who made it to the tournament.

The five teams from Africa are the Black Stars of Ghana, Teranga Lions of Senegal, Indomitable Lions of Cameroon, Atlas Lions of Morocco and Carthage Eagles of Tunisia.

The 2022 World Cup gets underway in Qatar today with the senior national team of Nigeria not at the event after failing to qualify by losing on away goal rule to Ghana.

However as many as five players of Nigerian descent will be at the tournament including those who were eligible for Nigeria and even indicated interest to play for Nigeria but weren’t given a look in.

One of them is Ike Ugbo who switched his international allegiance to Nigeria after representing England at several youth levels, but had to dust his Canadian passport after getting cold shoulders from the former coach of the team Gernot Rohr.

Ugbo’s goal-scoring put him on the radar of multiple national teams. In September 2021, as Ugbo was beginning to find the back of the net with Genk on a new permanent deal in the Belgian first division, he publicly stated that he would represent Nigeria. The chance to play in the 2022 World Cup was a driving factor.

Quietly, Ugbo still hesitated with his decision. He says now that he never heard from then-Nigeria national team coach Gernot Rohr throughout the process.

“And,” he added, “I never grew up in Nigeria, either.”

His first conversation with coach of Canada John Herdman in October 2021 changed everything and now he is heading to the World Cup following their qualification for the World Cup for the first time in almost four decades.

“(Herdman) knew about me from when I was at Chelsea,” Ugbo said. “He knew exactly what I was going through. He spoke to me about the ambitions of Canada and what he’s trying to do and what he’d already done. Already I could see, without him telling me, the direction Canada was going in”, he told The Athletic.

FC Porto and Nigeria international defender Zaidu Sanusi has come out with a proper translation of what Portugal midfielder Bruno Fernandes said after their 4-0 win over Nigeria.

Fernandez scored twice in the rout and was said to have dismissed the Super Eagles as a top team after the game. That statement went viral especially on social media owing to his damning dismissal of the team.

“Our match against Nigeria was not on the standard we wanted. Their level was not on a world class required standard. So here in Qatar we will face the World best. We wanted to play a tough national team, but all of them were already occupied. Nigeria was the only one available. They didn’t test us at all”, he was quoted as saying.

However many used the goggle translator to translate it to English as the interview was done in Portuguese but Zaidu who missed the game due to injury said the whole interview was taken out of context owing to the method used in translating it.

” Bruno gave the interview in Portuguese and what he said was they wanted a tough test before the World Cup hence the decision to play Nigeria. However the game was easier than they anticipated and they expect a tougher test in Qatar. More like telling the fans that all games won’t be like that at the World Cup”, he told OwnGoalNigeria.com.

Nigeria suffered one of their heaviest defeat in ten years by losing 0-4 to Portugal yesterday in an international friendly game played at the Estádio José Alvalade in Lisbon.

Emmanuel Dennis was the target of most Nigerians after he insisted on taking a penalty won by Bright Osayi-Samuel with scores at 0-2. Captain of the team William Troost Ekong had an argument with him over it.

Ekong was told by coach Jose Peseiro from the bench to take the spot kick but all attempts to get the ball from his former Watford teammate proved abortive. Ekong it looked like wanted Paul Onuachu to take the spot kick not even himself.

Dennis stood his ground and saw his effort come off the woodwork aided by a fingertip push by goalkeeper Rui Patricio. Two minutes later, Portugal scored two more goals to round up an empathic win. Peseiro admitted that the penalty miss changed the dynamic of the game but refuse to blame Dennis for taking it.

” I think we show here in the second half against a big team that we can do much better. Of course if you have a chance of bringing the scores to 1-2 and you missed a penalty that’s very sad but I am not chiding my players. My players try to do the right thing, try to fight for us”, he started of saying in his post match interview with NFFTV.

“This moment if you score 1-2 you can push for a draw but you didn’t score and after that you suffer two goals. I think we lose the balance in that moment. We have to improve, we must improve because we want to win the next AFCON”, he further stressed before absolving Dennis of any blame.

“I need one thing about that I speak with my players. In my team, in my national team I won’t allow one player to be killed. Okay, he missed a penalty.

“The next time we can train him more on how to take the penalty. We need to defend our players, which player don’t miss penalty in the world? I don’t know. Any player can miss penalty. It was Dennis today, he has my protection, he rounded up saying.