2022 World Cup Qualifiers: Nigeria Set For Liberia – Rohr

After seeing his men hold the Indomitable Lions of Cameroon to a 0-0 draw, German tactician, Gernot Rohr is confident the Super Eagles will be ready for the Lone Star of Liberia come September’s World Cup qualifier.

Despite relying on makeshift defenders, the three-time African champions ended the encounter at the Wiener Neustadt Stadium on a no winner, no vanquished note.

Though ruing the chances missed by his team, which he attributed to the absence of key players, Coach Rohr is upbeat that the Eagles would be ready when their quest to qualify for Qatar 2022 commences against their West African foes.

“The result is not the most important thing in these friendlies,” he said on Super Eagles’ Instagram handle.

“To most important thing is to test some players, to see some of these new faces. That was the case today, we didn’t want to concede.

“We wanted to score but we could not, but when you are missing players like [Victor] Osimhen, [Samuel] Chukwueze, [Joe] Aribo], [Samuel] Kalu and Henry [Onyekuru], it’s not easy.

“These players came in the middle of their holidays to work hard for ten days with us. The fruit of the work will come. I think we will be ready in September for our World Cup qualifier against Liberia.”

The Manager also reserved special accolades for Valentine Ozornwafor who held sway in Nigeria’s backline.

In the absence of William Troost-Ekong, the Galatasaray man provided cover for goalkeeper Maduka Okoye, while Nantes forward Moses Simon was drafted to play the left-back role.

Overall, the 67-year-old scored the former Enyimba centre-back very high, disclosing he has justified his senior national team call-up.

“We had a problem building the defence, so we played for the first time with Valentine and he did very well,” Rohr continued.

“He finished the match with Moses Simon who played in the left-back position and we didn’t concede a goal.

“I am very happy for Valentine. A lot of people did not understand why he was with us and he showed the reasons today. He did very well with his left foot in the central defence.” – With Goal.com report