2,161 total views,  6 views today

By Sobenna Nwagbo

Enugu Rangers International Football Club on Sunday 16th January, 2022 in FC Ifeanyi Uba Stadium, Nnewi defeated her visitors, MFM Football Club of Lagos (Olukoya Boys) in Matchday six encounter of Nigeria Professional Football League, 2021/2022 season.

Rangers adopted FCIU Stadium as home for the ‘Flying Anthelopes’ on approval of the League Management Company, pending the completion of repair work on the turf going on at the Nnamdi Azikiwe Stadium, Enugu.

First goal for Rangers was scored by the Captain, Tope Olusesi, who was set up by Ugochukwu Ugwuoke from the left hand side to the right from a dead ball situation and Tope jabbed the ball inside the net in 16th minutes of play.

The second goal was a penalty beautifully converted by Ossy Martins at 43rd minutes. The MFM Goalkeeper Osayi Kingdom had brought Ugochukwu Ugwuoke down in their 18 yard box after he intercepted a back-pass from his defender.

Despite the win, Rangers Technical Adviser, Coach Abdu Maikaba is not happy with the playing pitch. According to him, “this is not the type of field we play our brand of football, but whether you like it or not, this is now our home and my boys need to adjust. We are happy we won the match, but we keep improving”. According to him,” MFM has always been a difficult team again Rangers in recent years, because of young boys in the team who are ready to run till the end of 90 minutes”.

The Enugu State Commissioner for Youth and Sports, Manfred Nzekwe who watched the match said, “this is what we expect to see Rangers do all the time. Though the two teams are good, but Rangers has proven to be the best so far”. According to the Honourable Commissioner, “we thank the Nnewi fans and the entire Igbo race, Rangers is for South East and can play in any part of Igbo land as our home, but we pray to go back to our Enugu home in near future because we are putting the final touches in the turf and will soon get back to our tradition fans”.

The result has placed Rangers so far on the third position on NPFL table with 11 points from 6 matches behind Remo Stars(14) and Rivers United (12).