Lobi Stars of Makurdi coach, Gbenga Ogbunbote has called for caution in the ongoing spate of permutations that his side should be considered as champions of the Nigerian Professional Football League (NPFL), megasportsarena.com reports.
Despite admitting he is delighted seeing his side hog top spot of the NFPL for several weeks running, the former Shooting Stars of Ibadan, Sunshine Stars of Akure, Enyimba of Aba and Rangers of Enugu handler stressed that there is still a long way to go in the season.
Rather than start celebrating the Middle Belt side as champions in the making, Ogunbote stressed that his side are not getting carried away just yet after winning their Match Day 19 tie against visiting Wikki Tourists of Bauchi.
While relegation battlers Adamawa United of Yola and Jigawa Golden Stars of Jalingo showed that they are not ready to give up just yet in their fight for survival, Lobi Stars climbed back to the top on 35 points, courtesy of a 2-1 home win over Wikki Tourists, while Plateau United of Jos slipped to second after a scoreless draw away to Dakkada FC of Uyo.
Plateau United now have 33 points from 19 matches and Dakkada dropped to fifth on 29 points, while Rivers United of Port Harcourt stayed in third on 32 points, after they sank visiting Kwara United of Ilorin 1-0, as Ivory Coast attacker, Konan Ruffin N’Gouan tucked away a penalty after 67 minutes to give ‘The Pride of Rivers’ maximum points.
Sunshine Stars of Akure are now fourth after a 2-0 win at home over FC Ifeanyiubah of Nnewi, with goals by Jide Fatokun and Anthony Omaka, while Adamawa United recorded a rare win with a 1-0 victory over Heartland of Owerri.
Adamawa now have 17 points to leave bottom place, which is now occupied by Nasarawa United of Lafia, who fell 1-0 at fellow strugglers Jigawa, while Mountain of Fire & Miracles Ministry (MFM) FC of Lagos and Katsina United improved their standings on the table after home wins over Kano Pillars and Warri Wolves of Delta State respectively.
Katsina United are now seventh on the table with 27 points, while MFM FC are eighth with 26 points, but the main focus is on Lobi Stars, who many observers say are set to win ‘the authentic’ title this year, as against snatching it by default in 2018, when the season was truncated due to time constraints with the Confederation of African Football (CAF) calendar.
However, while admitting he is happy with the strides being made by his club thus far, Ogunbote stressed that they have to kep their feet on the pedal, and avoid complacency, in order to stay strong till the very last whistle of the campaign and become champs indeed.
He buttressed the fact that the Makurdi-based side have a strong desire to do well in the current campaign, while also affirming that they will give a good shot at trying to win the league title, but he quickly pointed out that there is still a long way to go, with 19 more games still to go this season, but promised that the players will continue working hard to sustain their momentum.
Ogunbote submitted: “Winning of the league is just too early now, we have as much as 19 games to determine that and anything could happen in between these 19 games. It’s a huge number. All we’re just trying to do is just to see that we do very well this season.
“Thank God we are occupying the first position. We want to see all we can do to manage the success. We are not focusing on the teams behind us, we are looking at sustaining the momentum and that means we have to work harder than we have done before.”
