Obi Mikel ready to lead Nigeria to knock-out stage
Ahead Russia 2018 World Cup
SUPER Eagles Captain, John Obi Mikel is keen to lead Nigeria to the knockout rounds of the 2018 FIFA World Cup finals, which will be hosted by Russia, reports africanfootball.com. The Super Eagles are in Group D alongside European sides Iceland and Croatia and South American giants, Argentina. They will face Croatia in their first game on June 16. The central midfielder will also be in action for Tianjin Teda FC during the 2018 Chinese Super League season, which will start this weekend.
“It will be a daunting challenge and I’m looking forward to both teams doing well, but now I’m totally in Tianjin Teda,” Mikel told Neteasesports. “It will be a long year for me. Now I have all my energy in Tianjin Teda for the new season, I’ll wait until after the start of the World Cup, I will transfer the same to the Nigerian team.
“This year I have been well prepared to deal with the Super League and the World Cup, these two events for the two teams, I will certainly be balanced,” the 30-year-old added.
“I am looking forward to Tianjin Teda to achieve good results in the Super League, but also hope that Nigerian team can go farther and better in the World Cup.” Meanwhile, the Volgograd Arena, which will host the 2018 World Cup Group D fixture between Nigeria and Iceland on June 22 is now ready, according to the website of FSUE SportEngineering, which is the developer and designer of the arena, writes Ria Sport.
The stadium, which was built on site of the demolished Central Stadium, at the foot of the Mamayev Kurgan memorial complex, near the Volga Rivera has a capacity of 45,568 spectators.
Before Nigeria’s meeting with Iceland at Volgograd Arena, Tunisia will take on England on June 18. The two other matches that will be played at the stadium are Saudi Arabia versus Egypt (June 25) and Japan versus Poland (June 28).
THE Eighth Cadet and Junior African Fencing Championship got underway yesterday at the Molade Okoya-thomas Indoor Sports Hall of the Teslim Balogun Stadium, Lagos with powerhouses, Algeria and Egypt maintaining their high ratings at the five-day tournament.
The North Africans are bound to have a good fight from South Africa, who also enjoyed a wave of victories on the opening day of the tournament. Nigerian fencers were also in action, but they were short of experience compared to their counterparts. Charles Joshua could not go beyond the final qualification stage, losing 15-4 to Ronan Ragavoodoo of Mauritius in the Individual Epee, while it was the same fate for Zaafir Olagunju who fell 15-10 to Ibrahim Ramadan, the third seed from Egypt.
Femi Adeniti also bowed to second-seeded Egyptian, Mohamed El-sayed 152, just as George Noval defeated his fellow South African Dorian Moretti to advance to the final phase of the Epee. Female fencers will take to the stage today with Semina Daminabo of Nigeria listed for action in the Individual Epee. Algeria and South Africa will each have four representatives while Cote d’ivoire has three.
Nigeria Fencing Federation President, Adeyinka Samuel expressed confidence that Nigeria will put up a good fight and win a few medals despite the country’s slow start.