Nigeria’s Flying Eagles suffered a 2-1 defeat against Saudi Arabia in a friendly encounter at the Sportschule Lindabrunn, Vienna on Sunday, reports Completesports.com.
The Saudi Arabians dominated proceedings in the first half but wasted a number of goal scoring opportunities.
Khalid Al-Ghannam gave the Asians the lead in the 55th minute.
Henry Offia, who was on target in Nigeria’s 3-3 draw against Freiburg last week equalized for the Flying Eagles in the 64th minute.
Hamed Alghamdi netted the winning goal for Saudi Arabia 12 minutes from time.
Paul Aigbogun’s charges will face German side Hoffenheim in their next game on Wednesday. They will also come up against Red Bull Salzburg on Tuesday May 14 and Red Bull Leipzig on Friday, May 17.
The players and their officials are expected to return to Ingoladst on Monday where they will continue preparation for the FIFA U-20 World Cup in Poland.
The Flying Eagles had a disappointing outing at the Africa U-20 Cup of Nations in Niger early in the year where they finished in fourth position.
They will face Qatar, United States of America and Ukraine in Group D at the world cup in Poland.
The West Africans will face Qatar in their opening game on May 24 with two other group games against the USA and Ukraine on May 27 and May 30 respectively.
by Adeboye Amosu
16 Comments
In as much as this is a friendly match,i really do not envisage any miracle from the flying eagles at the world cup proper because Paul Aigbogun has no business coaching any team with a vision. He presented the most disjointed team ever at the last afcon .the display was so unconvincing that i wondered if the team had a coach or if the coach had ideas.
Its just a friendly. Wise players wants to stay free from injury.
When they’ve not made the team yet?
Same here I’m expecting nothing spectacular except the other teams at the tournament also goes to sleep
We should give dem benefit if doubt.there is an infusion of homebase and large amount of foreign pros in dis squad.for this match many of d foreign based players especially four from england couldnt play d match today due to visa hitch but hopefully u would see a better result n d subsequent friendly games with rb leipzig,ingoslat abd obe oda team.
Sorrymeant other teams
Don’t blame the coach but the employer. This is what we get because the people in charge of our football doesn’t know much about the game. 1+1=2. God bless Nigeria!!!
I think Aigbogun executed the match with home based players.Our league is not as good as the Saudis so we shouldn’t be disappointed.
However,where we have strength is the mix of both foreign and local professionals.When we have a blend we can be very formidable.
It’s just a friendly anyway I’m sure the gaffer must have experimented so we shouldn’t buy much to this result.I believe in this team and by the look of things this is the most open youth team of Nigeria ever where players from around Europe and Nigeria are given opportunities to stake a claim for that we shall be powerful when the blend is formed.I think in a couple of weeks we shall have a lot better team that can stand it’s own in the championship.
Our goal scorer Henry Offia plays for IK Start in Sweden. So not only home based players.
My thought process cannot allow me look at this squad/camp with any seriousness.
It’s more like anything goes. The captain Ikouwem Utin spent last week in Israel chasing a contract and missed at least one match if not both.
Players are sauntering in and out of camp. I don’t see how they are focusing on the objective of a good world cup campaign. More players being linked to the camp in a daily basis.
Why we cannot have a good scouting network, decide on 35 players, work with them and then trim down to 23 players for the tournament, I don’t know.
The entire process leaves me without any expectations
Thanks!!! My point exactly. No organisation, no leadership. Every Tom, Dick and Harry is just entering camp and training with the team.
This is the only Nigerian team that lacks structure and leadership. Imagine after announcing provisional squad; the coach still allows players to walk into the team either bcos of agents or NFF top shots. Any foreign-based player that, maybe, lives in England, would claim to be a youth member of one premiership team and walk into flying eagles’ training. Don’t think that rubbish can be allowed in any other current Nigerian team. The coach should have maintained the bulk of the team that played qualifiers and replace if required, at least by now they’d have built strong chemistry. That said, I don’t expect us to win our first match against Qatar; in fact, Qatar may spell Nigeria. We may win other matches after playing Qatar. It’s a shame because we had ample opportunity to build a strong team.
All our foreign based under 21s wants to play for Super Eagles and not this Team. It is the FA that is allowing this nonsense,
Playing for the National team is actually not by age but by merit. The nonsense is something else (the same thing we all know about)
Well..its a friendly so maybe not that bad but one thing I know for sure is that Friendly or No Friendly if you are loosing to a Saudi Arabian Team in an Age Group Level then a big problem is around the corner
Ride on Aigbogun, winning U-20 or U-16 is not the purpose of introducing age grade World Cup but unearthing pure talents for world football n senior world Cup. I am so happy with Aigbogun trying to get both foreign n local mix together. Those foreign born are Nigerians n have got every right as every other Nigerian to be in our national teams.
Coach Aigbogun is currently doing his best by allows Nigerian born players in Europe to come and stake for a spot in the National U-20 team. The crops of players that came a distance 4th in the U-20 AFCON may not win the world cup even with the additional of the foreign proffessionals on the provisional list to subtitued some players that represented the nation in the AFCON. It was obvious that the team lack what it takes to lift the world cup given the team’s performance in the AFCON even the additional pros. With foreign born Nigerians coming to the camp to show their given talents should be applaud and not the other way round. Ulike those that are invited yet they turn down the invitations.