UD Almeria of Spain in-form striker, Sadiq Umar continued firing on all cylinders, as the former AS Roma of Italy, Glasgow Rangers of Scotland and Partizan Belgrade of Serbia star took his total haul for the season to 11 goals, megasportsarena.com reports.
While Leicester City of England attacker, Kelechi Iheanacho enacted a rare milestone of appearances as a substitute in the English Premier League, when he got off The Foxes’ bench in the 90th minute of Saturday’s victory over Wolverhampton Wanderers, Umar stole the show in Spain’s lower division.
The Rio 2016 Olympic Games bronze medalist took his tally to just one short of a dozen after he netted a brace in Almeria’s 5-0 trouncing of Alaves in a round of 16 Copa del Rey fixture, during which he opened scoring after just eight minutes.
Umar then made it 3-0 in first half stoppage time of the King’s Cup game for Almeria, who are also pushing for promotion back to the Spanish LaLiga and are currently third on the lower division table, just four points behind leaders Espanyol with a game in hand.
In Holland, Emil Maduka Okoye conceded five goals as Sparta Rotterdam bowed 5-3 to PSV Eindhoven in Saturday’s Eredivisie encounter.
Fuelled by a second-half brace from Donyell Malen, The Castle Lords were humbled in their own backyard, even as Henk Fraser’s men came into the game with the ambition of recording their first home win following back-to-back defeats, but the visitors had other ideas.
The hosts got off to a bright start in the fourth minute when Bryan Smeets unleashed an unstoppable shot past goalkeeper Yvon Mvogo due to some shambolic defending by the PSV defenders.
In the 24th minute, the visitors levelled matters through Mauro Junior, who headed past goalkeeper Okoye thanks to a cross from Cody Gakpo, who is of Togolese and Ghanaian descent.
Two minutes into the second-half, Malen restored PSV’s lead – beating Okoye from close range owing to another piece of poor defending by the hosts.
In the 49th minute, England youth international of Nigerian descent Noni Madueke gave Roger Schmidt’s men a two-goal lead – tapping home a simple pass from Netherlands youth international of Congolese origin Jordan Teze.
Philipp Max made it four goals after beating Okoye with a shot from outside the goal area, while Madueke, who has now scored six goals in 15 Dutch top-flight fixtures in the 2020-21 campaign, went off for Eran Zahavi with nine minutes left to play.
Okoye saw every minute of action for his team, but Cape Verde duo of Lorenzo Fonseca and Jeffry Fortes were not listed for the game, which saw Sparta Rotterdam remain ninth in the Dutch top-flight with 21 points from 17 matches.
In England, Andrew Omobamidele made his professional debut for Norwich City, as he got off The Canaries’ bench in the third minute of stoppage time and helped them beat Sheyi Ojo’s Cardiff City 2-1 on Saturday evening.
Omobamidele has been knocking on the first team door having made eight of ten squads before the game at Cardiff City Stadium, and he was finally rewarded with a senior debut by the coach, Daniel Farke three weeks after he signed his first professional contract.
Born in Dubin to a Nigerian father and Irish mother, Omobamidele has been capped by Republic of Ireland at U17, U18 and U19 levels, but now becomes the second Nigerian-born teenager to debut for Norwich’s first team this season, after the emergence of Tyrese Omotoye.
Same evening in England, two Nigerian-born players helped Crystal Palace overtake Fulham in the U18 English Premier League, following a 4-1 win that featured left-back Tayo Adaramola and striker Victor Akinwale starting for The Eagles.
Michael Olakigbe entered the game as a substitute for Fulham in the 56th minute, but Republic of under-17 international, Adaramola was the star of the show, scoring and forcing an own goal in the comprehensive home win.
Two minutes before half time, Palace took the lead as Thorsteinn Antonsson misdirected a cross from Adaramola into his own net and the Irish-Nigerian doubled the advantage when he curled an effort into the top corner seven minutes after the restart.
In the 55th minute, Akinwale fired home from close range to make it 3-0, with his fourth goal of the season, six months after he and Adaramola inked scholarship deals with Palace before the start of the season but the defender’s deal was upgraded to a professional contract in November.
In the English Premier League proper, former Manchester United youth team striker, Mipo Odubeko was named in West Ham United’s matchday squad for the first time in his career and saw his side defeat Burnley 1-0 at London Stadium on Saturday evening.
West Ham coach, David Moyes initially planned to give Odubeko his professional debut when they faced Charlton Athletic in the Carabao Cup in September, only for the teenage attacker to suffer a training ground injury before the game.
Having recovered from the injury kept him on the sidelines for four months, Moyes named Odubeko in his matchday squad against Stockport County and he got off the bench in the closing minutes of the English FA Cup third round game five days ago.
Though the 18-year-old Nigerian-born lad was a non-playing substitute against Burnley, it was a step forward for the youngster, who signed from Manchester United in October 2019, with a track record that includes goals on his debuts in the U18 Premier League, Premier League 2, FA Youth Cup and EFL Trophy for West Ham’s youth teams.
Same evening in the EPL, Leicester City attacker, Kelechi Iheanacho achieved a personal milestone during his side’s 2-0 win over Southampton on Saturday night, as he got off the bench in place of Jamie Vardy in the first minute of stoppage time.
In the process, Iheanacho took his career appearances as a substitute to one hundred, having played 50 games as a sub in the Premier League for the Foxes, three in the Carabao Cup, two in the FA Cup and one in the UEFA Europa League.
During Iheanacho’s time with Manchester City, he totaled 44 appearances as a substitute with 34 in the EPL, six in the UEFA Champions League, three in the FA Cup and one in the Carabao Cup.
Overall, he has 170 career appearances combined for Man City and Leicester, scoring 44 goals and providing 24 assists but, since joining his current club in August 2017, Iheanacho has made a total of 106 appearances – with 56 being from the bench.
