Cyriel Dessers celebrates after scoring a goal during the international soccer match between Mexico and Nigeria. (Photo by Matthew Visinsky/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
Cyriel Dessers says the Super Eagles remain confident ahead of the African Cup of Nations qualifiers, despite the poor results against Mexico and Ecuador.
The Eagles will kick start the Afcon qualifying campaign with a home game against Sierra Leone this Thursday, before flying to Morroco for another outing this time against Sao Tome and Principe four days later.
As part of preparations for both games, the team was involved in two friendlies and both games ended in defeats.
“They weren’t easy games , these teams are going to the World Cup and I think Mexico is ranked 9th or something. If you look at the results, we can’t be happy, but we are happy with the performance, especially in the second half against both sides.
“We dominated these teams and that gives us confidence for the qualifiers,” Dessers explained to www.brila.net.
The Genk’s striker led the attack for both games and scored once. However with Victor Osimhen and Sadiq Umar returning for the African Cup Nations qualifiers against Sierra Leone, Dessers admits, competition for places is tougher.
“It’s pretty hard, like you said, we are eight or nine strikers who can easily be called up anytime, of course there are only three or four spots, so, we have to fight hard every time to get in.
” I’m enjoying these competitions, and when we arrived here, we really help each other because we want to achieve same objective.”
