March 1, 2020
By Ijendu Iheaka
Fatai Osho, the Head Coach of Enyimba International Football Club of Aba, on Sunday assured that his team would recover from their home draw with Horoyà AC of Guinea.
Enyimba drew 1-1 with their Guinean guests in Aba on Sunday in the first leg match of their 2019/2020 CAF Confederation Cup quarter-final pairing.
Osho said the first leg game result was not enough to rule his team out of contention, as they still have the second leg game in Conakry on March 8 ahead of them.
He blamed his players’ lacklustre performance in the second half to injuries which he said they had been managing but which later became severe during the match.
“We have about 14 players nursing injuries and following the limited number of players required to be registered for this series of matches, the fitness level of my men was affected.
“We did not want to push them too much because we know that there would be a breaking point.
“Austin Oladapo, for example, did very well. But he is just coming back after missing about four or five matches.
“We have to put that into consideration so that we don’t hurt the boy. The future is more important to us and it goes beyond today’s result.
“The strength in the middle was not there, because we had a lot of new players coming in,’’ the coach said.
He however pointed out that his excuse was not meant to take anything away from Horoya AC.
“They did very well to get this result and they did better than us.
“But, fortunately, this is a two-legged affair. We are still going to Guinea and we are still going to make use of our chances,” he said.
Oladapo scored Enyimba’s only goal in the 18th minute, while Horoya’s Boniface Haba who replaced Mbemba Camara scored the equaliser in the 72nd minute.
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