Head coach of the senior national team of Nigeria Jose Peseiro has drawn up the provisional list of players that will represent Nigeria at the Africa Cup of Nations next year, OwnGoalNigeria.com can exclusively reveal.
The coach will submit the list to CAF on or before the 14th of December, which is a month to the tournament where the Super Eagles have been handed a mandate of getting to the final at least for the coach to earn an extension of his deal.
Peseiro will trim the provisional list to 27 players before the start of the tournament and he is expected to include some players who are yet to taste action with the team since he took over as coach over a year ago.
One of the players who have been handed a first time opportunity to be in the squad is Montpellier forward Jerome Akor Adams. He is in the list of forwards submitted by the coach to the NFF for vetting by the technical department and also the technical committee.
Akor who has seven goals in 14 Ligue 1 games is however facing serious competition to make the final list of players with the team loaded with options like Terem Moffi, Sadiq Umar, Victor Osimhen, Victor Boniface and Kelechi Iheanacho.
The situation is the same with two other players whom we exclusively gathered are also in the provisional list in Gift Orban and Chuba Akpom.
Akpom in particular stands a very good chance of making the list as he suits the manager’s style of a two man attack as he loves to play in the role behind the main striker. He has also found his feet at Dutch giants Ajax.
In his last four games, he has found the back of the net five times. A remarkable turnaround after an initial period of struggle following his move from English Championship side Middlesbrough in the summer.
Mohammed Mowiz Suleiman
