Enyimba Stumbles At Home, Draw 1-1 With MFM
Enyimba’s profligacy in front of goal saw MFM sharing the points with a full-time score at 1-1 at the Enyimba International Stadium, Aba on Saturday in a Nigerian Professional Football League (NPFL) MatchDay 14 encounter.
The People’s Elephant were tipped to wallop a struggling MFM side that is bottom on the league table and they did have a bright start as early as the 7th minute when a long ball from goalkeeper Olorunleke Ojo was nicely controlled by Emeka Obioma.
Obioma did well to beat his marker before laying a through ball to onrushing Victor Mbaoma in a good shooting position. Mbaoma was composed enough to pick his spot at the far post to give the home team the lead.
Five minutes later, Enyimba was stunned as the first real attack from MFM ended in the back of the net.
After a quick interchange of passes in their half, MFM sent a long ball into their opponent’s half and Chukwudi Ekeocha outpaced his marker before slotting the ball between the legs of onrushing goalkeeper Ojo for the equalizer.
Then came the series of misses from the Enyimba forwards, Obioma and Mbaoma with both hitting the post with their efforts when it was easier to score in the first half.
Goalkeeper Jerry Isaac was a rock between the post for MFM as he made several saves in the game including a powerful header from substitute Godwin Emmanuel inside the box in the 81st minute.
An excited Ikechukwu Christian was full of praise for his team and could not believe the outcome of the game;
“Honestly the result was unexpected, Enyimba is like the biggest team and coming here to pull a draw is like a victory to us”, he said.
On their chances to get themselves out of the relegation zone, he said their focus is on getting the boys to focus on working hard.
“On our walk out of relegation troubles, something must happen and picking up such draw is the tonic needed to boost the confidence of the team.
“I just took over the job two weeks ago and I told them that we need to keep working hard and our target is how we can get out of the relegation zone because MFM is not supposed to be where they are”, he concluded.
A very humbled Olorunleke Ojo, goalkeeper of Enyimba was at a loss on the spate of poor results despite the efforts of the team. He also called on the fans not to give up on the team.
“It’s quite unfortunate what is happening today as you could also see from the faces of the fans that came out to support us. We have put in the work and management have put in all that is needed for us to succeed but the results are not favourable”.
NPFL/Nnenna.O
