Nigeria coach Salisu Yusuf has explained that his players showed great character to come through a tough 2017 WAFU Cup of Nations clash against Sierra Leone on Monday night.
Moses Okoro and Moses Peter scored a goal apiece in the final five minutes of the tie to hand the Super Eagles a 2-0 win at the Cape Coast Sports Stadium and see them progress into the group stage.
Yusuf made it clear that Nigeria’s preparation for the WAFU tournament took a back seat while they were playing Cameroon in back-to-back 2018 World Cup qualifiers.
“We didn’t have training [except for] one day because we were so much concerned with the World Cup qualifiers against Cameroon,” he told the post-match press conference.
“It’s the most important. We have qualified for CHAN [African Nations Championship], so we had to take a risk that all our concentration will be on the World Cup first.
“It was a good decision and it was a good game, because we came here with the same squad that played Benin in the last CHAN qualifier and we played the same system.
“We had some good young players come in, but they cannot play because they never trained. All of them played a league match on Saturday and travelled long distances, so there was no recovery.
“The players have done very well, they have shown great character to survive this game.”