Nigeria forward Umar Sadiq is relieved to score his first goal for Italian Serie B side Perugia, completesports.com reports.
Sadiq, 22, spent the first half of the season on loan at Scottish club Glasgow Rangers from AS Roma where he struggled to make a meaningful impact.
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He made five appearances for Steven Gerrard’s men in all competitions and failed to register a goal.
The Rio 2016 Olympics bronze medalist also failed to hit the back of the net in his first six appearances for Perugia.
But he finally scored in a 3-2 win at Venezia this week – his first goal at any level since he scored for NAC Breda at Sparta Rotterdam 11 months ago.
Sadiq picked up the ball in his own half before running towards goal and unleashed a brilliant strike beyond the Venezia keeper.
“That was a very emotional goal for me,” Sadiq told Scottish Sun.
“It’s been a difficult time for me at Rangers and starting again here at Perugia.
“But I never lost faith in my own ability.
“I dedicate that goal to our fans and I hope I can progress from here at the club.”
By Adeboye Amosu
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COMMENTS
Spotting jersey 19 yesterday for Perugia, Sadiq Umar ran almost the length of the pitch with the ball prior to breaking strides to beat his man before curling an absolute beauty to beat the goalkeeper and achieve what he has not done in 11 months: find the back of the net.
With such a wretched goal scoring form, it is no surprise that Sadiq Umar’s name fails to come up in any fan’s fantasy football team ahead of the 2019 Africa Cup of Nations.
Funny enough, it wasn’t that long ago that some media outlets were reporting that the 2016 Olympic Bronze medalist believed he should be considered for Nigeria’s squad to the 2018 world cup.
With the commencement of the 2019 Africa Cup of Nations looming, I very much doubt that Sadiq – with the kind of poor season he is having – will be clamouring for his own invitation to the Super Eagles squad ahead of the continental showpiece.
But, with at least 10 more games to go between now until the end of the Seria “B” season in Italy, should Sadiq Umar regain a rich vein of form and continue banging goals, is there case for him to be considered for the Super Eagles?
Some would instantly argue that because he is playing division 2 football in Italy, that should automatically rule him out of contention. Others will point his relative lack of senior international football experience whilst a more obvious and credible argument is that there are many “better” and more experienced strikers ahead of him in the present Super Eagles set up.
All that being the case, the qualities that Sadiq Umar brings to the table are quite eye-catching.
He is powerful centre forward with aerial threat and a decent eye for goals (despite his recent barren).For one so tall, Sadiq has bags of pace and has been seen to display the odd moments of trickery to get the best of defenders. He can be quite tenacious and rugged in the final third.
In Under-23 football, Sadiq was selected ahead of the highly experienced Taiwo Awoniyi at that level for the Olympics and he scored 4 goals in 6 matches to justify his selection.
Sadiq Umar may be spotted in a Super Eagles jersey one of these days but the chances of him making the 2019 Afcon squad are slimmer than slim as he would have to score many, many goals between now and the end of the season and hope the likes of Ighalo, not only lose form, but also fall out of favour with Gernot Rohr.
I don’t see that happening!
I expected so much from this guy! He impressed at the Olympics with his all-action style of play. Erratic finishing was always his problem. Besides that, I always felt he should be considered for a spot in the SE squad. Having said that, there are others who are catching the eye recently, like Awoniyi, Akpom and Onuachu. Let’s see who Rohr decides to go with.