Cyprus-based goalkeeper, Francis Odinaka Uzoho appears set to start Thursday’s World Cup qualifier for Nigeria against Central African Republic (CAR), following the late arrival of original first choice, Emil Maduka Okoye from Sparta Rotterdam of Netherlands.
Okoye has been Nigeria’s number one i9n goal for the past six matches and looked likely to start against CAR in the Super Eagles’ third match of the Qatar 2022 qualifiers, but his late arrival in camp has put that possibility in doubt.
To further cast doubt over the chances of Okoye getting into the first eleven for Thursday’s game at Teslim Balogun Stadium in Lagos, Eagles’ coach, Gernot Rohr scolded the Germany-born shot-stopper for ‘unprofessional conduct’ in reporting late to camp.
Rohr was aghast with Okoye’s failure to turn up until Tuesday night, which the Franco-German gaffer declared as unacceptable, thereby serving a strong hint that the former Fortuna Dusseldorf of Germany netminder might be axed for Thursday’s game.
Although Okoye, who the youngest of the three goalkeepers invited for the game and only made his debut for the Eagles in an international friendly against Brazil in October 2019, disclosed that he missed his flight to Lagos, Rohr was unequivocal in his condemnation of the star’s conduct.
Consequently, it might become the first time for Okoye to miss out on Nigeria’s matchday roster, despite starting all but one of the last ten games played by the Eagles and was last benched on November 17, 2019.
Rohr said: “The late arrival of Maduka, he arrived in the night only. He missed his flight, I am not happy about it, it’s not professional.
“I am not sure that he will start the game, we have two other goalkeepers. He did one training session in the gym, then he will do another (in the) afternoon.
“Everybody believes that it will be an easy victory, it’s not an easy match and when players are arriving late like this it is not helping us when we say we have to be serious.
“I spoke with him, he knows that it is not good, they were trying to have a good flight for him to come early he missed it.
“They have to learn to be really serious when they come to the national team.”
