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Udinese goalkeeper Maduka Okoye has squandered the biggest chance he has to be the first choice for the senior Nigerian team, OwnGoalNigeria.com can exclusively reveal.
Okoye has missed two training sessions and will only train once with the team before tomorrow’s game after coach Eric Chelle granted him permission to spend two more days.
He stayed on to model the club’s shirt, but it is a decision that ultimately cost him the rare opportunity to eclipse the returning Stanley Nwabali.
Nwabali has not played for the team since AFCON, which Okoye ironically spurned to show loyalty to Udinese, who supported him after a ban for his alleged involvement in betting.
In Nwabali’s absence, Chelle welcomed Okoye back into the team and kept goal in high-profile friendlies against Poland and Portugal respectively in June.
We can exclusively reveal that Okoye was due to retain his place in the AFCON qualifiers for matches against Madagascar and Guinea-Bissau respectively, hence the decision not to include him in the squad that will play Russia in a friendly match on October 6.
That match was supposed to be Nwabali’s return to the team, and that was the reason why Chelle chose him as the only senior goalkeeper in the team for the match, but that arrangement has now been altered by Okoye’s absence.
Barring a late change of heart, Nwabali is now expected to be in goal with Arthur Okonkwo as his replacement, although Okoye will arrive today.
Sources say he is not in the plan for tomorrow’s game as his teammates are unhappy with his constant attitude of arriving late to camp. An act that at the time led former coach Gernot Rohr to leave him in a World Cup qualification match against Liberia.
Rohr made it clear that it was the third time he had arrived late to camp in a period of three international breaks. Based on what we’ve gathered, it’s only a matter of time before Chelle also takes the same step.
Mohammed Mowiz Suleiman
