Junior La Celeste hoping to cage Eaglets

Garba Manu boys continue their quest for a fourth Fifa U17 World title with a last-eight showdown against Fabian Coito’s side in Sharjah

The high-flying Nigerian U-17 national team will seek a place in the semi final of the 15th edition of the Fifa U-17 World Championship when they face Uruguay on Saturday in what happens to be the star fixture of the quarter final pairings.


The Golden Eaglets got to this round after a comprehensive bashing of Iran in their second round match played in Al Ain while their South American opposition saw off challenge from Slovakia to book a date with the free-scoring Nigerians.

Although both countries will be meeting at this level of football for the very first time, they will be hoping to outwit one another for a place in the semi final where Sweden awaits them for a final ticket.

With Isaac Success still out of Nigeria squad, coach Garba Manu is expected to stick to his starting eleven that played the last three games while expecting that team’s leading scorer- who is also in contention for the top scorer’s award, Kelechi Iheanacho to re-ignite his goal scoring form against the Uruguayans.

Fabian Coito on the other hand is not bothered about the Golden Eaglets’ breath-taking run so far not to mention the fact that Nigeria has never lost any quarter final game in this competition which gives him less concern.

Cito will be banking on Franco Acosta and Leandro Otormin who boast of four goals each in this tourney to exploit the defensive weaknesses of the Musa Muhammed anchored backline for a place in their first semi-final ever in their third appearance.

Nigeria boast of an intimidating record of 18 goals in four games against their opposition’s 14 aside their peculiarity of topping their respective groups in the preliminaries. Should the Eaglets triumph on Saturday, they will join Mexico and Sweden (their opponents in the group stage) in the semi-final.

PROBABLE LINEUPS

NIGERIA Alampasu Muhammed, Bello,  Okon Nwakali, Idowu, Ezeh, Alfa, Yahaya   Iheanacho , Awoniyi

URUGUAY Cardozo Bregonis, Etcheverry, Suarez, Buschiazzo  Pizzichillo, Mendez, Faber, Acosta Benitez, Ottormin