Soccer Profile - Mikel, the midfield heart of Super Eagles Football

Mikel was supposed to be the next Okocha. HOLD THE PRESS. Nobody may EVER have the greatness the great Jay Jay possessed, but Mikel was supposed to be the next STAR of the Eagles. I have said it before...if he stayed at United, Nigeria would have had an outstanding player. What they have now is a player that is stuck in two worlds. At Chelsea, he is a defensive midfielder that passes sideways...at Nigeria, he is forced to be the playmaker and the heartbeat of the team. Those are two very different roles, and two HIGHLY important ones. He was meant to ONLY be the latter...but Mourinho had other thoughts.

For Keshi, he will know that Mikel will be HIGHLY important in the tough trip to Addis Ababa. He will need Mikel to CONTROL the game, and force Ethopia to play to his rhythm. That means once Nigeria have the ball, Keshi must want Mikel to make the Ethiopians work hard and sweat to try and win it back.

Matches are won and lost in the midfield. That's just how it is. The attack and defence are highly important. But the team that controls the midfield, WINS...nine times out of ten. So Keshi will know of what importance Mikel will be in the middle of that pitch. Of course, Mikel will expect to be in his comfort zone in Calabar...but away from home and with the pressure on, it will be harder to CONTROL the game. But, if Nigeria lose the midfield battle and are forced to chase and don't have any sort of rhythm....then Ethiopia will take heart and WIN THIS DAMN GAME.


It gets real tomorrow, and people need to STEP THE HECK UP AND GET THE JOB DONE.

ZERO excuses.



HH