1FC Union Berlin of Germany striker, Taiwo Awoniyi is in a race against time to overcome injury and get a long-awaited invitation to the Super Eagles, megasportsarena.com reports.
With a much-desired senior national team call up looming large for the UAE 2013 FIFA U-17 World Cup gold medalist, who has been loaned by Liverpool of England to several clubs since signing he dotted lines in 2015, looking good to eventually emerge, injury is set to play the spoiler.
The fervent prayer that will be going through Awoniyi’s lips now must be for divine intervention to help him overcome the blight that is threatening his historic moment, as the product of Universal Football Academy of Odogbolu, Ogun State could miss an invitation for next month’s Africa Cup of Nations qualifiers against Benin Republic and Lesotho.
This comes after Union Berlin announced that the 23-year-old striker is nursing a thigh muscle injury and will be out of action for the foreseeable future, consequent upon which he was not listed for the team’s last German Bundesliga game against SC Freiburg.
Incidentally, Super Eagles’ coach, Gernot Rohr mentioned Awoniyi among the lads he hopes will be available for selection next month against Benin Republic in Cotonou and Lesotho in Lagos, with the Franco-German tactician also worried about the situation with SSC Napoli of Italy top striker, Victor Osimhen, who suffered concussion last weekend in the Italian Serie A.
The Eagles’ handler also spoke about his plans for Lorient of France rave of the moment, Terem Moffi, Racing Genk of Belgium’s Paul Ebere Onuachu and Almeria of Spain’s Sadiq Umar, even as he restated his desire to have fresh power in attack against The Squirrels on March 22 and The Crocodiles on March 30.
Rohr told News Central TV: “We hope Osimhen is back to full fitness; he’s the leading scorer. Moffi scored winning goals against PSG and Monaco, he’s a left-footed striker, it will be interesting to see him.
“There is also Awoniyi at Union Berlin and Sadiq Umar, who is doing well at Almeria; he was the Player of the Month. We also have Onuachu, who is scoring so many goals, but has some problems when he plays for Nigeria.”
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