April 25, 2017

Chelsea aren’t finishing this season without a bit of heart-stopping entertainment. The Blues again fail to keep a clean sheet, giving their supporters heart palpitations during a competitive first half before finishing off Southampton in comfortable fashion in the second.

Chelsea 4-2 Southampton

Gary Cahill’s goal just before the half proved decisive for Chelsea, dispatching Southampton by a 4-2 score line to push their lead at the top to seven points and put the pressure on Tottenham to respond against Crystal Palace at Selhurst Park on Wednesday night.

Chelsea’s worrying trend at home has again emerged. Not only did the Blues fail to keep a clean sheet, but once again, the home side got off to a flying start by scoring an early goal, just to see visitors settle and equalise midway through the first half.

This time, it was Eden Hazard putting Chelsea ahead when he swept home Diego Costa’s pull back to give the Blues the lead after just five minutes.

It looked for a minute as Chelsea had learned from their mistakes against Crystal Palace and press their advantage, and Hazard nearly had his second when he fired wide from a flick-on from Costa.

Southampton sent nerves around Stamford Bridge with every set piece. James Ward-Prowse’s pinpoint deliveries gave Chelsea’s defence all sorts of issues, and Southampton’s equaliser came from a corner.

A misplaced clearance from Cesar Azpilicueta was retrieved by Manolo Gabbiadini whose shot was parried by Thibault Courtois straight into the path of former Chelsea player Oriol Romeu who couldn’t miss from close range.

Southampton looked to control the match, but caught a sucker punch right before the half. N’Golo Kante picked out Marcos Alonso with a cross, and Cahill rose to meet Alonso’s header back across goal and send it past Fraser Forster to give the Blues a lead they wouldn’t relinquish.

The proposed match up of retired African players scheduled to host in Lagos this weekend has been postponed.

The match which was supposed to pitch legends from west and central Africa with those of the southern hemisphere of the continent is at the behest of two major foundations in the continent – Nelson Mandela Foundation and the Kanu Heart Foundation.

The Local Organising Committee after exhaustive deliberation on the preparation to host the first leg match of the African Legends charity match and in consultations with some of the partners decided to shift the Nigerian part of the match to first week of August.

Nigeria’s Nwankwo Kanu is the vice chairman of the African Football legends, headquartered in South Africa.

It has in its fold, prominent names that have graced the African and global fields.

Among them are Roger Milla of Cameroon, George Weah of Liberia, Mark Fish and Lucas Radebe of South Africa, Samuel Eto’o and Abedi Pele Ayew. The list is endless.

According to the release from the LOC in Nigeria, Nwakwo Kanu explained that most of the partners in the project pleaded for more time to put the needed logistics in place.

Former Nigerian international and NFF’s Assistant Director (Technical), Siji Lagunju is excited being one of 35 technical officials from across the African continent presently attending a six –day CAF Pro-License Elite Instructors Course in Cameroon.

The CAF Development Division invited a total of 35 elite coaching instructors from CAF’s Member Associations for the course taking place at the CAF Centre of Excellence, Mbankomo, near Yaounde.

The course, which kicked off on Monday, 24th April, is the first of its type in Africa, and thenff.com learnt that the CAF Development Division combined the course contents of the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) and those of the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) and brought on board technical gurus to develop the content for Africa’s specific needs.

Participants in the six –day course are expected to return to their different countries and organize Pro-License Courses for elite Coaches in their territories.

“We started lectures on Monday and I can tell you that I am very excited as a result of the course content. It is very rich and intensive, and of very high grade, and will definitely make the participants better elite coaching instructors,” Lagunju said.