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Tag: Enyeama

  • Enyeama: They compare me to a monkey

    Nigeria custodian Vincent Enyeama participated in a promotional video against racism and has shared his thoughts and impressions on the situation in Israel.

    Sports.walla.co.il quoted Enyeama as saying: ”Players who use racist expressions must be punished. Israeli soccer is infected with racism. The fans do not support enough teams and hiss when things do not work properly on the field. We try to bring about a situation where for 90 minutes the fans will concentrate on encouraging the team to the end of the game. Fans should be there for the team and support it. “

    The Maccabi Tel Aviv numero uno says he has encountered racism in Israel but diplomatically refused to mention specific incidents.

    ”A lot, trust me, a lot. I do not want to start mentioning specific cases, but I saw it a few times. Encountered racism in the restaurant, just down the street, I heard the grunts on the field and it’s really something abnormal. It is crazy comparing you to a monkey, how can you? It is not normal,” says Enyeama.

    Going further, Vincent Enyeama advised the Israeli Federation to wield the big stick on fans that are involved in racism.

    ”Association definitely needs to pay attention to it. Israel is a country that is so beautiful, it’s a lovely place to live and these kind of things do not need to happen here. I really love Israel. I certainly think clubs should be punished for the racism of fans. Look what they did to Toto Tamuz and Apollo Adele in the game against Beitar and I’m sorry about this incident, this inappropriate behavior. I saw serious cases when I played in Hapoel Tel Aviv, but I do not want to talk about it.

    “Players who use racist expressions must be punished if they are caught. Look what happened with John Obi Mikel from Chelsea, he was suspended for three games in England.”

  • ENYEAMA OPENS UP WHY I JOINED MACCABI TEL AVIV

    ENYEAMA OPENS UP WHY I JOINED MACCABI TEL AVIV

    SUPER EAGLES’ stand-in goalie, Vincent Enyeama has disclosed that Maccabi Tel Aviv showed enough seriousness to have him in their fold while Hapoel Tel Aviv, his former club kept mute about their desire.

    Enyeama in a chat with SportingLife in Calabar recently stated that he chose Maccabi despite being city rivals to his previous club because Hapoel have had their quota for foreign based players occupied while his present on loan club came in manhunt to get him.

    “I didn’t have a reason to go back to Hapoel because the players at the club had filled up the five foreign slots and Maccabi needed me. Hapoel has goal keepers and did not demand for my recall so I went to where I will be able to get games that I clamoured for in France,” he said.

    Reacting to the demonstrations from Hapoel’s fans of his alleged betrayal of one-time club, Enyeama stressed that he stayed calm and never cared about the fans’ backlash but concentrated on his next target-which is to do well for Maccabi. “I am a professional. I stayed calm and calculated and moved on to do my job because I don’t care about what happened on the streets,” the former Enyimba goaltender said.

    The Cross River born player who was the skipper when the Eagles got a ticket to next year’s Africa Cup of Nations slated for South Africa at the expense of Liberia’s Lone Stars expressed his delight at the nation’s qualification which he recalled was a bitter pill to swallow last year when the country’s hope for a place in Gabon and Equatorial Guinea was truncated by the Syli Stars of Guinea in Abuja.

  • Enyeama concedes three goals

    Enyeama concedes three goals

    • As Maccabi falls 1-3 to Hapoel in Israeli league

    • Says it’s part of football

    Barely 10 days to the Super Eagles’ AFCON clash against Lone Star of Liberia in Calabar, embattled number one goalie and Maccabi Tel Aviv’s safehand Vincent Enyeama Monday suffered a major away defeat in the Israeli league. The former Enyimba ace was caught on camera making an obscene gesture after Monday’s 1-3 painful loss to Hapoel Be’er Sheva.

    The defeat suffered by The Yellows was the first dropped points of the 2012 – 2013 season and leaves the club in second place, three points behind MS Ashdod, who parade Nigeria left back Juwon Oshaniwa.

    Sports Walla quoted Enyeama as saying after the game: ”According to the result it seems that nothing went well for us. You could say that nothing was good. We lost and also conceded three goals; it could even have been eight or nine, then we lost and everything went wrong. But that’s okay, it’s part of football.”

    Enyeama, who recently came under fire for what was dubbed his schoolboy errors in away games with Malawi and Liberia, conceeded the goals against Hapoel Be’er Sheva through set-pieces.

    ”It happens, really. (It’s) Part of the game. After you concede three goals like that, you’ve got to prepare, for it not to happen again in games to come. If we think now, thinking (about the loss) is not good, it will not help to us,” says Enyeama to the Israeli website.

    Asked for his comments on who to blame for defeat, Enyeama admitted: ”I do not blame any player for losing. I blame the team. We play 11 players with a yellow shirt, so we belong to the same team. We lose as a team. Maybe the defense was not good enough this time, so we suffered three goals, no problem, we will work on it. We still have lots of games to play and we have to check the video again and again where we went wrong and what we did wrong.”

    Maccabi Tel Aviv’s consolation goal was scored by home boy Munas Dabbur in the 49th minute while goals against the Nigerian were scored in the 40th, 67th and 83rd minutes respectively.

  • ‘We still believe in Enyeama’

    • Shorunmu says Maccabi Tel Aviv goalie remains Eagles’ No. 1
    here is no cause for alarm over the choice of Vincent Enyeama as Eagles’ first choice in goal as goalkeeper trainer and Eagles’ Assistant coach, Ike Shorunmu has thrown his weight behind the embattled Israeli league star.
    There have been hue and cry over the performance of the Lille of France star on loan to Maccabi Tel Aviv, Israel and he was again in the news for negative reasons having been blamed for the equaliser in Liberia versus Eagles Africa Nations Cup qualifier decided in Monrovia on Saturday.
    But Shorunmu was resolute in his defense of his goalkeeper asking critics to leave him alone and not put undue pressure on him while also confirming him as the team’s numero uno (number one).
    “I don’t want to condemn any player in this kind of situation because if we win, we win together and when we drew, we drew together and if we lose, God forbid!, we lose together. That’s how it should be and that is why we call it a team.
    “We are building a team that everybody has to put his input in it. When you are building a team you don’t have to condemn anybody. The same Enyeama everybody has been praising everywhere and every time can’t just be condemned like that. Maybe he is going through some pressure and we have to give him our support.
    “We still believe in him and what happened in the match against Liberia in Monrovia can happen to any player so we took it as a team. I believe he will bounce back,” the former Shooting Stars Football Club goalkeeper told SportingLife yesterday.
    Shorunmu said that getting a 2-2 draw should be commended if the situation the team faced in Monrovia is to be put into consideration. He also believed that the Eagles can turn the game around in the return leg in Nigeria.
    “We need to thank God for everything. Playing a draw away from home is never easy. There is no pushover country anymore in football. You can see almighty Cameroon losing 2-0 away to Cape Verde, to tell you that there is no minnow any more in football. Thank God we didn’t have this kind of disaster in Monrovia on Satu

    Enyeama

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    “In the match we had a lot of chances while Liberia too had their own fair share of chances in the game but that is how it had to end. It is a lesson to us and an eye opener too that we will take to the next game. There are mistakes we made in the match; I know that there is room for corrections and we are going to do just that. We are eyeing victory in this match at least to put smiles onto the faces of soccer-loving Nigerians and we will achieve this in the return leg here in Nigeria by the special grace of God.
    “The Liberian team played well because of the support they got from their vociferous fans and I am confident that our team will enjoy such support or even better here in Nigeria. This kind of support will surely fire us up to deliver and win the return leg Insha Allah (by God’s grace)”, the former Eagles’ safe hands assured.

  • Only Keshi can decide Enyeama’s fate —NFF

    EXECUTIVE Committee member of the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF), Emeka Inyama has declared that only Super Eagles coach, Stephen Keshi has the prerogative to decide the fate of first choice goalkeeper, Vincent Enyeama as far as the national team is concerned.

    Speaking exclusively to NationSport in Lagos yesterday, the ace journalist said as part of the resolve by the NFF to allow the coach full control of the team, whether the Maccabi Haifa player will still be in Keshi’s plans will be the sole decision of the coach. “Vincent Enyeama’s case is for the coach to address; he has the right to hire and fire.

    He is the one who invites players; he has seen the team and may have discovered the deficient areas. He has told the players, if you have to come late, don’t come. If you don’t want to play for Nigeria, don’t show up. “So, he has read the riot act, he knows those who have not done well and it will now show in his next invitation.

    We in the federationhave given the coach free rein and full powers to deal with the team. So, the coach determines who the culprit is,” he said. Inyama said the outcome of the Nations Cup qualification match against Liberia last Saturday should not cause any alarm, adding that the one point scooped from the encounter as a result of the 2-2 draw puts Nigeria in a vintage position to clinch the ticket.

    “Well, for me what is important is the outcome of the match. There is no cause for alarm. The board is not shaken. The intention was to prepare the team for a win against Liberia. You would recall that in an international friendly we defeated them 2-0 in Monrovia.

    “So, the motivation was there. The visit of Mr. President added to that zeal to win but at the end of the day the match turned out to be a 2-2 draw; that means we came back with a point. It is a two-legged affair which means we now have to target the second leg in Nigeria.

    By the time we win we will have four points out of the six and that will take us to the Nations Cup,” he said. Inyama continued: “We are not resting on our oars, although we are disappointed with the result. It may not be what we expected, but it has not broken our hearts, rather it has put us in good stead to prepare.

    You must know that today whenever it concerns Nigeria, every country will rise to want to win, otherwise beating Liberia shouldn’t be a problem.”
    Baring his mind on the hostility meted to out to Nigeria in Liberia, Inyama, who also doubles as the Chairman of the Nigeria National League (NNL), said although the NFF will not pay the Lone Stars in their own coin, the treatment in Monrovia was disappointing. His words:

    The hostility in Liberia was expected and that was why the NFF made their own arrangements for alternative hotels, buses and all that, because we knew that the Liberians were desperate to win, and if you are conversant with African football these are the usual antics.

    So, that was expected but it shouldn’t be because it is between two friendly nations. So, we were not surprised by the antics, but we were disappointed by it. When they come to Nigeria, we will still give them the best treatment.”