By Jon Essien
The Minister of Youths and Sports Development Sunday Dare has called on the home-based Super Eagles players to give their best ahead of the July 3 international friendly against Mexico.
Dare, gave the charge on Tuesday when he visited the team’s training camp in Abuja before their departure to the United States of America.
In his words, the minister expressed his desire to see at least three players from the Nigeria Professional Football League make it into the mainstream Super Eagles.
Recall that Dare had accused Super Eagles gaffer Gernot Rohr of treating the NPFL stars unfairly and in what would be seen as a fresh support for more injection of home- based players into the A team, the minister admonished selected players to justify their invitation when they battle El Tri at at the LA Coliseum.
He said: “The Friendly is very important as you have an opportunity to showcase your talents and also displace some players in the main team.
“Ensure that when you go out there you make this country proud. I’m sure the NFF will not just make this a show, I’m sure that Nigerians will see 3-6 of you eventually end up in the main Super Eagles.
“So you have an opportunity to improve yourself. I’m sure sure when next we play our Nations or World Cup qualifiers, we are going to to see home and foreign- based players blend together which would mean that this country is maximizing her talents.I’m sure you’ll do the country proud .It might not count with FIFA because It’s friendly but it’s going to count for us” he said.
Technical Director of the Nigeria Football Federation Austin Eguavoen will be in charge of the team and the former Super Eagles handler has expressed optimism that the lads will impress and earn a shock result in the international friendly.
“There are huge potentials in the Nigeria domestic league players and I believe playing Mexico in USA is a big chance to showcase their talents to the world, Eguavoen said.
”From what I have seen so far in training and comments from the boys, I can assure you that these players are not going on site-seeing in America but to prove their mettle and enhance their chances of breaking into the main Super Eagles team,! as well as the CHAN team,” the former Genk of Belgium defender enthused.
