Enugu Rangers attacking midfielder Kelvin Itoya has told footballlive.ng that he is happy with his goal in the team’s 3 – 1 win over the Defence Force of Ethiopia but having qualified for the first round of the Championship to play Algeria’s USM Bel-Abbes he insists that the journey will only get tougher but the team is up to the task and ready to make the country proud on the continent.
Taking a two goal lead to Ethiopia for the second leg of the CAF Confederations Cup, the Aiteo Cup champions were shocked in the second minute when the home side converted a penalty but brushed themselves up to win the match 3-1 qualifying with a 5 – 1 aggregate.
Bright Silas and Godwin Aguda scored for the away side in the first half before super substitute Kelvin Itoya made it three in the 81st minute. Itoya revealed to footballlive.ng that what gave the team the confidence was their decision not to park the bus. ”We give God all the glory, Defence Force is not a bad side, Before leaving Nigeria we had already made a resolve that we were not going to stay back and defend but we were going to come all out and attack and I thank God that it paid off in the end.
We listened to the coaches’ instruction, we came out to play our game, we got the equalizer, and went on to win the game as early as the first half and thank God I was able to get the third goal when I came on.”
With the victory, Enugu Rangers will now face Algerian side USM Bel-Abbes in the first round of the championship and Itoya is confident that the team will do well, also calling for support from Nigerians. “Going into the second round and meeting an Algerian side, it’s going to be a tough one also and we want Nigerians to rally round us with their support and prayers and I think we would get the desired result and progress to the playoff stage, we’ll take the games one at a time and see how it goes”
USM Bel-Abbes beat LISCR of Liberia 5 – 0 on aggregate to progress to the first round winning 4 – 0 in Algeria and 1 – o in Liberia. USAM Bel Abbes after playing 15 games in the Algerian League 1 are currently 14th on the table in a 16 team league winning three matches with six loses and six draws.
