The Golden Eaglet of Nigeria Saturday’s training monitored by Owngoalnigeria.com was done in the absence of head coach of the team Manu Garba. Ahmed Ishaya who covered the team’s training reports that the physical test done by the team in the early hours of this morning was conducted by the assistant coaches of the team in the persons of Atun Ali and Ernest Teigpanyo.
We however gathered that the coach who won the U-17 World Cup for Nigeria in 2013 is still in charge of the team but traveled down to his hometown in Gombe State to attend to a pressing family demand.
He is expected back in Abuja on Monday as the team step up their efforts with 60 players selected after a month of screening over 5,000 players.
The process of reducing them to 30 will last another two weeks ahead of their first Africa Youth Championship qualifiers against Niger Republic in August.
Nigeria are World Champions at U-17 level after lifting the last two editions of the tournament in 2013 and 2015 but at the last Africa Youth Championship they placed third.