Former Super Eagles coach, Christian Chukwu, has withdrawn his support foreign based players for home-based players in the qualifiers for the 2024 African Cup of Nations’ (AFCON).
As the Super Eagles heads into the final game in the qualifiers against Sao Tome and Principe, Chukwu advised the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) to dump foreign players and use home-based players for the match.
Looking ahead to Nigeria playing host to Sao Tome and Principe in Uyo on September 10, he said that the apathy to home-based players in the Super Eagles has deprived many talents the exposure they need to raise their game.
He said that with the Eagles having secured their ticket to AFCON, the coaches should aim at discovering talents from the pool of home-based players to be injected into the team.
According to the former coach, “the game against Sao Tome should be for the home-based players and we have abundant talents that can compete with the foreign-based players, but they are not exposed in the Super Eagles.
“With proper blending of the home-based players and quality coaching, they will beat Sao Tome. We have better players in the Nigerian Premier Football League (NPFL) than some of the overseas-based players that are always invited to the Eagles.”
Meanwhile, NFF Director, Media, Ademola Olajire, has explained that the game against Sao Tome is part of the preparatory matches for the 2026 World Cup qualifiers starting in November.
