Kenneth Omeruo Wants Super Eagles To Settle Scores With Angola On-field

Super Eagles defender, Kenneth Omeruo has insisted that he and his team would only engage their opponents on the pitch not off-field.

Kenneth Omeruo’s assertion is coming after a series of past has been dug out after it was confirmed that the Super Eagles of Nigeria will face Angola in the 2023 AFCON quarter-finals.

One of the past that has been dug out was the demise of Nigeria’s Sam Okwaraji while playing against Angola in a 1990 World Cup qualifier in Lagos on August 12, 1989. Though Nigeria won the game 1-0, the Eagles failed to qualify for the tournament.

Also, Angola stopped the Super Eagles from qualifying for the 2006 World Cup after beating Nigeria in their country and drawing the Eagles in the return leg.

Since then, Nigeria and Angola have not met in a competitive game as the Angolans have failed to qualify for any international competition in the last 14 years.

Angola are going into the 2023 AFCON quarter finals game against Nigeria at 6 p.m. on Friday, February 2, as the 28th-ranked team in Africa and the 117th-ranked team in the world.

Hence, most Nigerian football enthusiasts believe that this is the right time for the Super Eagles who are ranked 6th in Africa and 42nd in the world to pay Angolans back for the “misfortunes” they caused Nigeria in the past.

But Kenneth Omeruo said: “We have absolutely no need to go into back-and-forth chatter with any team. The Super Eagles are in Ivory Coast for serious business. We have not played Angola for a long time but I remember we played them in 2012 in a friendly and it ended in a draw. I have also read of how previous encounters between the two countries have been quite close.

“There is no possibility of Friday’s match ending in a draw; a winner must emerge. So much talk has been going on. Our collective resolve is to do the talking on the pitch. The Nigerian spirit trumps all.”

He added, “We drew our first match (against Equatorial Guinea) and many people concluded that we are not here to compete strongly for the trophy. They have since admitted that we may be up to something after we defeated Cote d’Ivoire, and then Cameroon. We must continue to work hard, believe in ourselves, and put in a solid shift each day and time we get onto the field.”