Reigning African champions, the Super Eagles of Nigeria held its first training session in the Canaan City of Calabar on Monday as the team began its final preparation for the Brazil 2014 World Cup qualifier against Kenya next Saturday.
Second choice goalkeeper, Austin Ejide, Michael Babatunde and Fegor Ogude were the first foreign-based stars to join the Super Eagles camp. They were among the 12 out of the 23 players expected to feature for the national team against the Harambee Stars of Kenya that started training in Calabar.
Ogude flew into Calabar with the team from Abuja, while Ejide joined the others at the Transcorp Metropolitan Hotel about an hour after the team’s arrival. Babatunde was just on time to hop into the team’s bus for the day’s training session.
The team departed for training at about 3:30pm at the Abraham Ordia Sports Complex inside the University of Calabar and will repeat same tomorrow and all through the days leading to the match against Harambee Stars.
Head Coach, Stephen Keshi says he expects a full house by this morning, adding that training will be the same time and all players expected should have been in, as he needs a good number of training sessions for the team to jell against Kenya.
“We would have a full house for Tuesday’s evening training and from there we see how ready the players are for the task at hand,” he declared.
The team had a light training session with the UNICAL Football team before it went into its own session that was supervised by Keshi and his assistants. The nine Nigeria Premier League stars in the team are Chigozie Agbim, Godfrey Oboabona, Azubuike Egwueke, Gabriel Reuben, Sunday Mba, Solomon Kwambe, Benjamin Francis, Obinna Nwachukwu and Gambo Mohammed.
