Odion Ighalo and his Al Hilal teammates will look to secure a place in the final of the FIFA Club World Cup when they face Chelsea on Wednesday (today) at the
Mohammed bin Zayed Stadium.
Al Hilal thrashed UAE club Al Jazira 6-1 in the quarter-final on Sunday, but will be up against a tougher opposition in the European champions.
Ighalo scored the opening goal for the Saudi Arabia Professional Football League outfit against the hosts and will lead the line against the Blues.
The Nigeria international played against Chelsea during his stint in the Premier League with Watford and Manchester United and know what to expect from the West London club.
Read Also: CAF Snubs Super Eagles Stars In AFCON 2021 Best X1
“When you think about the teams you are going to face in the Club World Cup, high level and big teams that won in their continent,”
Ighalo said to FIFA’s official website.
“We are going to play against Chelsea, good team which I have played against before so it’s one of those highlights in your career that you’re always going to cherish after you finish playing football.
“As you know the goal of the team and fans is to win and win because this team don’t understand losing. It is to win and hopefully we’re going to win and do our best.”
The winner will face South American champions Palmeiras in the final on Sunday.
By Adeboye Amosu
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COMMENTS
Nice one ,I will start supporting you to to the world cup because the so called young strikers disappointed me.i will advice eguavoen to invite ighalo and drop those failed young strikers for WCQ.
Good luck Odion Ighalo and God bless Nigerians.
Ighalo didnt become a goal scoring threat overnight. He perfected the act after much training and determination. There were moments in his super eagles career when he wasn’t scoring goals and after the last world cup he wanted to resign from professional football until coach rohr convinced him to do otherwise. He was able to improve his goals scoring abilities after that emerging as highest goal scorer in an afcon tournament and highest goal scorer in a qualifier.
I guess what im trying to say is despite his goal scoring feat at club level he still needed time to settle in the national team after which the goals kept coming for him.
Our young strikers also need time to settle. I cant and wont blame Awoniyi or Sadiq for not clicking at the last afcon because they haven’t had the length of time they need to gel with the team before embarking on a major competition like the afcon.
Players like iwobi, chukwueze, ekong etc can receive some measure of criticism but not the new guys who only spent a few days (give or take a few weeks) with the team before playing at the afcon.
So lets give them some time and lets see if they can improve their game as they spend more time with the team.