Following their 1-1 draw with Bayelsa United in a pre-season friendly on Saturday, head coach of Akwa United Fatai Osho has revealed that his team will soon be ready for the new football season, stressing that the building process of a formidable team that will challenge for honours is still in progress.
Former Dakkada FC forward Isaac George gave Bayelsa United the lead in the 14th minute when his ferocious strike beat Godgift Elkanah in the near post. Cyril Olisema leveled the scoreline six minutes later when he cleverly chipped a low pass over the Bayelsa United goalkeeper in what was a lively first-half.
Efforts by both teams to score the winning goal were either missed or saved by the goalkeepers as both sides ended the pre-season game in a friendly fashion.
Coach Fatai whose team lost their first pre-season friendly 1-3 to Enyimba International on Wednesday at the same venue said he has taken a lots of positives from the games but informed that the two results are inconsequential as he continues to build a new team for the 2023-24 season.
”
I’m impressed that we did very well in today’s game, especially in the first-half. We conceded an early goal, we fought back and equalized and had some good opportunities to score but we couldn’t make the most of our chances
.
”
In the second half, our visitors changed their whole team and had some freshness. We were unable to do the same because of some injury concerns involving our midfielders, but we are excited that these two friendly games have given us a good opportunity to look at our players and how well they understand my playing style and approach to games.
“We are working to ensure we have a good team for the new season. These two games have given us something to think about and all the noticeable lapses will be corrected because we are still working. We owe the fans a lot, and we want to call on everyone to be patient with us because we are still a work in progress. I want to assure everyone at the club that we will be ready for the task ahead in a very short time”.
The 1-1 draw with Bayelsa United was their second pre-season friendly at Uyo township stadium in a space of four days and coach Fatai hinted that the team will play some more friendly games in the weeks to come as part of the building process for the new Nigeria Premier Football League season which is billed to kickoff on August, 26.
