The Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) has expressed shock at an incident that almost marred Saturday’s 2-0 victory of the Golden Eaglets over Uruguay in the quarterfinals of the Fifa Under-17 World Cup in the United Arab Emirates.
The Nigeria under-17s were cruising to a 2-0 win at the Sharjah Stadium when scorer of the two goals on the night, Taiwo Awoniyi collapsed in a pain late on with an injury which eventually ended his participation in the game.
Astonishingly, the match referee, Jair Marrufo from the United States sternly ordered the stricken youngster to get back on his feet rather than call for the Nigerian medics to attend to him.
Marrufo eventually backtracked on his hard-line stance but not before courting the ire of NFF president, Alhaji Aminu Maigari who told supersport.com after the game that he was shocked at the unfortunate events of Saturday evening.
“To be honest, I was shocked and saddened at that act of the referee. I don’t like speaking about referees but what happened (on Saturday evening) was something that made me sad. It was obvious that Awoniyi was injured as he was still in tears at the end of the game,” Maigari told supersport.com from Sharjah.
The win sets up a repeat of the Group F clash between Nigeria and Sweden but this time, a place in the showpiece game is the reward for the victors in Dubai on November 5 and Maigari is confident the Golden Eaglets will progress to the final.
“Sweden is the only team we have failed to beat so far in this competition and we know why we drew that game (3-3 in Al-Ain on October 22).
“That element of surprise is gone now and they (Sweden) know they will be in for a very difficult game against our boys,” he said.
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