Super Eagles’ coach, Eric Sekou Chelle is basking in the euphoria of his team’s 4-0 spanking of Mozambique at the Africa Cup of Nations but acknowledged that they still have a lot of work to do in order to lift the trophy.
Sports247 reports that the Eagles dominated Monday’s game from beginning to end and achieved their first clean sheet of the ongoing tournament in Morocco, but Chelle admitted things will get tougher in the quarterfinals.
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The Franco-Malian tactician began by thanking his players for the brilliant run they are currently enjoying at AFCON 2025, especially with Monday’s win, but stressed that they have to keep their feet on the pedal.
Chelle affirmed, “I am very proud of my players. They played a great game, but it’s not yet over. This is only one game; we now have to prepare for the next.
“We will leave for Marrakech to play against Algeria or DRC. My dream is to stay on the stretch and get a lot of training sessions to prepare for that match.”
He continued with a view that only extra effort from the coaches and players would take Nigeria into the semi-finals and assured that they will internally settle all worrisome issues that occurred during Monday’s game.
The soft-spoken tactician added, “We want to do what will make us able to win the next game. We should be able to win the next game; but it depends on what we do on the pitch.
“Every day, I try to be the best coach of this team. I try to give them an example of what I want. I prefer to die with my philosophy and ideas, but it also means we have to do a lot of work.”
Chelle continued by heaping praise on his team’s high scoring ratio at the ongoing competition but quickly admitted that he has to work more on the defence, which eventually got a clean sheet on Monday.
“The fact is that we’ve scored 12 goals, and we’ve conceded four; but I believe the fans are happy when they come to see our games.
“Football is about scoring, and my aim is to win every game. My vision is to improve with every game and score more goals,” Chelle noted.
He concluded by recalling the promise he made about building a high scoring squad but stressed that it is equally important to have a solid defence line to keep goals out against your team.
Chelle recounted, “When I took this job, I made a promise in my first press conference that we would score goals, but we never talked about the defence.
“That’s one issue we are facing here … because Ola (Aina) is not here (William) Troost-Ekong is not here and (Benjamin) Fredrick is not here.
“But we also know that if you want to win a tournament, you have to be strong in defence. So, we are trying to improve our defence, as we try to improve our midfield and our attack as well.”
