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NFF will continue programme to improve ‘unlucky’ Super Eagles B team — Pinnick

NIGERIA Football Federation President Amaju Pinnick believes the Super Eagles B team will improve when they get more exposure and experience, which his governing body will help provide.

The team of home-based players were beaten 4-0 in a friendly by a full-strength Mexico in Los Angeles on Sunday morning, but Pinnick insists the result will not stop the NFF from its programme aimed at improving the team.

Pinnick, who is also a member of the FIFA Council, advised the players to learn from the wide-margin defeat to the CONCACAF Gold Cup defending champions, rather than let it affect their confidence.

“There is nothing that has happened here that will discourage us from pushing ahead with the plan we have for the team,” Pinnick said after the match watched by 53,258 spectators inside the LA Coliseum in California.

“Our programme to get the team to a higher level through regular exposure to the toughest games possible will continue apace.

“I believe the players gave their best in the encounter, and the result could have been different if we didn’t concede those early goals and we took our chances that came immediately after. The difference was in greater experience and much more exposure, and nothing stops our boys from standing up to the Mexicans with a number of games under their belts in the next few months.”

Despite the result, which saw Mexico score twice in each half to get their second win over Nigeria at senior level in six meetings, Pinnick praised the Nigerian players.

“I am strongly of the belief that the players should be commended for their efforts in the game. They did not just lie down to be slaughtered,” he noted.

“They put up a fight and were only unlucky.
“We will go ahead and deliver on the programme we have for them to be
a much stronger team, as we look forward to the next African Nations
Championship (CHAN).”

The NFF says the squad could make a return to the United States of America in a few months for more friendly games as part of the co-operation agreement with the Government of State of Maryland, which Pinnick and Lieutenant Governor Boyd Rutherford signed last week.

The co-operation agreement is based on
shared vision and shared values and with the pillar of mutual understanding for rapid development, according to the NFF.

The delegation of Super Eagles B is expected back in Nigeria on Wednesday morning.

The qualifying matches for the seventh edition of CHAN, the African competition for national teams made up of home-based players, are scheduled to begin before the end of the year.

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