Nigeria Premier Football League (NPFL) club Bendel Insurance have congratulated their goalkeeper Amas Obasogie after his invitation to the Super Eagles camp.
The Super Eagles will trade tackles with Lesotho on November 16 at the Godswill Akpabio Stadium before heading to Zimbabwe for a game with their national team at the Huye Stadium.
Super Eagles coach Jose Peseiro had earlier unveiled a 23 man list for the upcoming fixtures with three goalkeepers Francis Uzoho, Maduka Okoye and Olorunleke Ojo.
However Okoye withdrew from the squad for undisclosed reasons and he has since been replaced with Obasogie.
Read Also: 2026 WCQ: Godswill Akpabio Stadium Ready To Host Super Eagles vs Lesotho (PHOTOS)
The Edo State based clubside took to their X handle to hail their exalted goaltender.
“Finding a new perch is a reliable BIRD, confident between the sticks, tested and trusted. Congratulations, AMAS ‘LEWINSKY’ OBASOGIE @Amasobasogie1 on your invitation to the @NGSuperEagles for the 2026 @FIFAWorldCup qualifiers against Lesotho and Zimbabwe,” the post reads.
This is Obasogie’s first time ever of been invited by the Super Eagles of Nigeria.
Obasogie has made seven appearances in the Npfl for the Benin Arsenals this campaign.
Bendel Insurance are sixth position in the current NPFL standings with 12 points obtained across seven games.
The Super Eagles have qualified for six FIFA World Cup tournaments (USA 1994, France 1998, Korea/Japan 2002, South Africa 2010, Brazil 2014 and Russia 2018).
8 Comments
If I’m the coach, I would let Obasogie keep for Nigeria against Lesotho
That shows that we don’t have a deserved coach for Super Eagles. NFF are there to distract and destroy our football period. Ire o. God bless Nigeria!!!
Omo9ja,
Let’s rally round the coaching crew. Peseiro is trying his best.
Also, I don’t think the time is right to consider changing coaches. Let’s see how Peseiro prosecutes these world cup qualifiers.
I feel really bad that Okoye has stayed away from honouring several national team invitations recently.
He was a high flier in Holland when he controversially pulled out of the world cup qualifiers against Ghana. Who knows, Eguavoen may have used him in Uzoho’s stead with history re-written in our favour.
Back then, I was critical of Okoye, expressing my concerns about his goalkeeping skills. I just felt he wasn’t precocious.
But with time I have become more sympathetic. I respect the fact that he has been working really hard to improve himself in his trade. But I don’t think he is mentally mature or ready for the criticisms that naturally come from being a goalkeeper.
Which is why I duff my hat for people like Akpeyi and Uzoho.
Their will power must be made of adamantium. The more fans abuse them, the stiffer their resolve.
Unless Rohr himself chose to drop Akpeyi or Peseiro likewise with Uzoho, aggrieved fans can go and drink otapiapia: Uzoho and Akpeyi would honour national team invitations and they would take their places in between the sticks on match days if selected as number one.
I think Okoye needs to develop that cement-like resolve. Fans are not coaches and no matter what we say, coaches will select whomever they want and play these players.
Despite the backlash from England fans and press, Coach Southgate continues to select Manchester United flop Harry Maguire.
Okoye should man-up. I am not his fan but he is not a sub-par goalkeeper. He has glaring shortcomings but age is on his side and he has massive potentials to improve exponentially.
By shunning national team invitations, he is burning bridges with the person that matters the most – not us fans who are just toothless bulldogs – but the coach who chose to stick with him despite a barage of criticisms.
He should take a leaf from Uzoho books. By the special grace of God he will be in post in world cup qualifiers. Anyone not happy with this can flip sides to support Lesotho and Zimbabwe.
Bishop,
It will be too risky to try new hands in crucial world cup qualifiers. Uzoho is now skating on thin ice. Any more mistakes from him in these 2 matches could now prove costly for him.
So, one can only pray that he has put the extra training shift to address his shortcomings.
Barring injury I expect to see him in post. The confidence investment placed in him by Peseiro and Eguavoen should see him raise the level of his performance.
Let’s face it, Peseiro’s patience with Uzoho is not infinite. I think it is even wearing thin but fans don’t know it.
Leading up to the 2018 World Cup, Rohr rode against the tide and tirade of fans to stick with Akpeyi until that unfortunate miscommunication against Argentina sealed Akpeyi’s fate.
With Okoye seemingly uninterested in fighting for his place and Adeleye having no place in the in the team, it will be interesting to see who will take over if Uzoho’s blunders become too hot for Peseiro to handle.
The National Job is not for chicken hearted fellows, when i was growing up as a child in benin city, if you are too scared as a child, your parents will give you to the masqurade, and the masqurade will throw you up as much as he wants, he will show you his urgly maquraded face in a very closed range,if you go die, die”, untill you no longer have any signs of fear in you. Parents use to stage different kids in the evening to start teasing each other with strong words, the first to cry over any abuse or gets emotional, is the loser, they also use to gather the kids for wrestling challenges expecially from the age of 14, if your back touches the ground in the process of wrestling infact you will hide your face in the nest one month, there is another game they called riddles and divination, one child will throw a word of parables and the other one will be Challenged to disolve the parable into a meaningfull explaination, these are games that our parents trained us with, and built us to be, so that we can face every expected obstacles of life, i believe its thesame in most Nigeria tribes too, like the urhobos, Esan, igbos etc, this is what makes a Nigerian and what seperates Nigerians from others, if you canot cope you should quit, National duty is not psychoterapię or a motherless baby home, football is the most important sport to us, and we have millions of people who wants to be in that position, they are been paid and better treated than our military and police force, yet you will come and say you are afraid of common football shot from ranges, when soldiers are facing hot bullet for our sake, any body who is not mind enough to mount the post should clear road immediately, let obasogie take the place if there is no option anymore, we can invite Nnadozie, imagine for where woman they lion, naim man wan dey monkey??? If you go to the Street of lagos there are many goal keepers that can do better than Enyeama, even Dr drey will do better than okoye
Well, Okoye has excused himself from several Super Eagles invitations so I guess one can rule him out of contention.
Uzoho seems to have a stronger mental fortitude which hasn’t fully translated to his goalkeeping capabilities.
But I pray the glorious gamble of months of Eguavoen and Peseiro keeping faith in Uzoho will yield much fruit. He now needs to tap into the rhythm that makes the roots of a competent goalkeeper to sprout compelling performances in key games to come.
Even for me, the games against Lesotho and Zimbabwe are last chance saloon for Uzoho. If he fumbles in these games then Peseiro will be foolhardy to make him number one in the Afcon.
For Okoye, if he hasn’t got the breadbasket for the fight or for criticisms then it’s better he stays as far away from the Super Eagles as sea to sky.