{"id":177783,"date":"2025-09-05T07:10:35","date_gmt":"2025-09-05T06:10:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/uncategorized\/koulibaly-on-persuading-osimhen-to-join-al-hilal"},"modified":"2025-09-05T08:37:45","modified_gmt":"2025-09-05T07:37:45","slug":"koulibaly-on-persuading-osimhen-to-join-al-hilal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/sport\/koulibaly-on-persuading-osimhen-to-join-al-hilal","title":{"rendered":"Koulibaly on Persuading Osimhen to Join Al-Hilal"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"color: #ff6600\"><strong>Africa-Press &#8211; Nigeria. <\/strong><\/span>Al-Hilal defender, Kalidou Koulibaly, has revealed what Galatasaray striker, Victor Osimhen told him when he tried to convince him to join the Saudi Arabia club.<\/p>\n<p>Koulibaly and Osimhen were former teammates during their time together at Napoli.<\/p>\n<p>Osimhen had spent last season on loan at Galatasaray before he joined the Turkish champions on a permanent transfer from Napoli during the summer transfer window.<\/p>\n<p>But the Nigeria international was linked to Al-Hilal on several occasions in the summer but turned down a move to the club as he ended up singing for Galatasaray.<\/p>\n<p>Speaking to La Gazzetta dello Sport, Koulibaly said: \u201cI tried to explain to Osimhen that the perception of football in Saudi Arabia was wrong, but he told me why he chose Galatasaray.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI told Osimhen honestly about the reality in Arabia, saying that our tournament was being judged from a wrong or limited perspective. There are many top-level players here, starting with Cristiano Ronaldo.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cOsimhen told me that Istanbul welcomed him and his family with enthusiasm and that they have big goals. He has made his own decision. I wish him the best,\u201d the Senegalese said.<\/p>\n<p><strong>For More News And Analysis About <span style=\"color: #ff6600\">Nigeria<\/span> Follow <span style=\"color: #ff6600\">Africa-Press<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Africa-Press &#8211; Nigeria. Al-Hilal defender, Kalidou Koulibaly, has revealed what Galatasaray striker, Victor Osimhen told him when he tried to convince him to join the Saudi Arabia club. Koulibaly and Osimhen were former teammates during their time together at Napoli. Osimhen had spent last season on loan at Galatasaray before he joined the Turkish champions [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":177782,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,18],"tags":[9779,6667,254,1816],"class_list":["post-177783","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-sport","tag-al-hilal","tag-koulibaly","tag-nigeria","tag-osimhen"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v26.1 (Yoast SEO v27.0) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Koulibaly on Persuading Osimhen to Join Al-Hilal - Nigeria<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Al-Hilal defender, Kalidou Koulibaly, has revealed what Galatasaray striker, Victor Osimhen told him when he tried to co ...\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/sport\/koulibaly-on-persuading-osimhen-to-join-al-hilal\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Koulibaly on Persuading Osimhen to Join Al-Hilal\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Al-Hilal defender, Kalidou Koulibaly, has revealed what Galatasaray striker, Victor Osimhen told him when he tried to co ...\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/sport\/koulibaly-on-persuading-osimhen-to-join-al-hilal\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Nigeria\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2025-09-05T06:10:35+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2025-09-05T07:37:45+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/sites\/3\/2025\/09\/sm_1757045408.45374.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1920\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1080\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/sport\/koulibaly-on-persuading-osimhen-to-join-al-hilal#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/sport\/koulibaly-on-persuading-osimhen-to-join-al-hilal\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"headline\":\"Koulibaly on Persuading Osimhen to Join Al-Hilal\",\"datePublished\":\"2025-09-05T06:10:35+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2025-09-05T07:37:45+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/sport\/koulibaly-on-persuading-osimhen-to-join-al-hilal\"},\"wordCount\":207,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/sport\/koulibaly-on-persuading-osimhen-to-join-al-hilal#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/sites\/3\/2025\/09\/sm_1757045408.45374.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Al Hilal\",\"Koulibaly\",\"Nigeria\",\"Osimhen\"],\"articleSection\":[\"all news\",\"Sport\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/sport\/koulibaly-on-persuading-osimhen-to-join-al-hilal#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/sport\/koulibaly-on-persuading-osimhen-to-join-al-hilal\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/sport\/koulibaly-on-persuading-osimhen-to-join-al-hilal\",\"name\":\"Koulibaly on Persuading Osimhen to Join Al-Hilal - 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