{"id":9604,"date":"2019-05-04T14:48:50","date_gmt":"2019-05-04T14:48:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.com\/nigeria\/?p=9604"},"modified":"2019-05-04T14:48:50","modified_gmt":"2019-05-04T14:48:50","slug":"afcon-2019-why-nigeria-could-rely-on-this-23-year-old-star-despite-current-form","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/nigeria\/all-news\/afcon-2019-why-nigeria-could-rely-on-this-23-year-old-star-despite-current-form","title":{"rendered":"AFCON 2019: Why Nigeria Could Rely On This 23-Year-Old Star Despite Current Form"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Nigeria winger Alex Iwobi is going through a rough patch at the Emirates Stadium, no thanks to his inability to convert many begging chances that often come his way during matches this season.<\/p>\n<p>The 23-year-old was largely criticized by the Gunners fans after missing a clear-cut opportunity during their 3-0 defeat to Leicester City last week Sunday.<\/p>\n<p>Irrespective of his current form, the Hale End academy product still remains one of Super Eagles players who Nigerians could trust to lead the country to her fourth AFCON title in July.<\/p>\n<p>Though the Arsenal winger isn&#8217;t known to score plenty of goals, his trademark passes and ability to marshal the midfield (if Mikel isn&#8217;t around) will help to create chances for his teammates.<\/p>\n<p>As much as he needs to work on his decision making and end product, Iwobi can be deployed as Nigeria&#8217;s secret goalscoring machine in Egypt just as he did against Zambia during a 2018 World Cup qualifier.<\/p>\n<p>It was Iwobi&#8217;s lone goal that ensured the Super Eagles were the first African side to qualify for the World Cup with a game to play despite being in a very tough group.<\/p>\n<p>The Super Eagles are hoping to make huge statement on their return to the continental stage by winning the AFCON in Egypt and Iwobi needs to up his game because he&#8217;s one of the players who can help the team achieve their ultimate target.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Nigeria winger Alex Iwobi is going through a rough patch at the Emirates Stadium, no thanks to his inability to convert many begging chances that often come his way during matches this season. The 23-year-old was largely criticized by the Gunners fans after missing a clear-cut opportunity during their 3-0 defeat to Leicester City last [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":62,"featured_media":6154,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,18],"tags":[468,184,446,122],"class_list":["post-9604","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-sport","tag-afcon","tag-iwobi","tag-obi-mikel","tag-sports"],"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>AFCON 2019: Why Nigeria Could Rely On This 23-Year-Old Star Despite Current Form - Nigeria<\/title>\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\/all-news\/afcon-2019-why-nigeria-could-rely-on-this-23-year-old-star-despite-current-form\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"AFCON 2019: Why Nigeria Could Rely On This 23-Year-Old Star Despite Current Form\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Nigeria winger Alex Iwobi is going through a rough patch at the Emirates Stadium, no thanks to his inability to convert many begging chances that often come his way during matches this season. 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