Vice captain of the Super Eagles of Nigeria Ogenyi Onazi has agreed with critics that his performance should have been better against England in Saturday’s 1-2 friendly loss at Wembley .
Onazi was highly ineffective for the Eagles for the entire duration of the first half that he was on the pitch and it was from his error that England took possession of the ball which led to the build up of their second goal.
Alongside Joel Obi in a three man midfield which also had captain Mikel Obi, they failed to stop the English midfielders from running riot in the first half. Something the Nigerian team were able to do in the second half following a change of tactics and substitution.
Defending his poor performance, Onazi who was one of the midfielders substituted in the second half of the game as Nigeria switched to a 3-5-2 formation said their initial approach to the game made it impossible for him to play at his best.
“I have to get better. That wasn’t me yesterday. I don’t really want to think about the game too much. The problem we had yesterday was the formation, it was not going really right. I did a lot of running on the pitch because we were always one man short on the defensive part of the game.
“The second half was much better because we played the same pattern with them and everybody was with his man,” Onazi explained.
Shedrack Obi
