Coach of the senior national team of Nigeria Gernot Rohr has defended his decision to include Odion Ighalo in his squad for the 2022 World Cup qualifiers games against Liberia and Cape Verde respectively.
Rohr hasn’t hidden his desire to have the Al Shabab forward back in his team for the World Cup qualifiers and has held talks with him over rescinding his decision to quit the Nigeria national team.
Ighalo quit the team in 2019 shortly after finishing as top scorer at the Africa Cup Of Nations, a year after he was subjected to several abuses as Nigeria crashe out of the World Cup with a 1-2 loss to Argentina. He missed a chance to put Nigeria up in the game.
The coach in an interview on Elegbete TV was asked the reason why he still want the striker back in the team despite the fact that players like Victor Osimhen, Paul Onuachu, Taiwo Awoniyi, Kelechi Iheanacho and Terem Moffi are doing well for their respective teams in Europe.
“We have so many good strikers, we invited Awoniyi the last time. We had Moffi, we had the other one like you know Onuachu of course and Osimhen is actually number one but we don’t have anyone like Ighalo. Ighalo is different, he is a special player. He sees everything, he feels, he smells the football. I think our team now with his maturity, with his experience he could help us much more”, he explained.
