2022 World Cup playoffs: Daniel Amartey made our game plan against Ghana difficult – Nigeria coach Augustine Eguavoen

Augustine Eguavoen, the head coach of Nigeria has admitted that the Black Stars were the better side adding that Daniel Amartey made the game difficult for his side in the first leg of their 2022 FIFA World Cup qualifying play-offs in Kumasi.

The Black Stars settled for a draw in the first leg at the Baba Yara Stadium on Friday.

Speaking ahead of the return leg, Eguavoen said Nigeria would try and take the game to Ghana again, after trying and failing to do so in the first leg.

“The team is in high spirit we are more than halfway through I had word with them and praised them because they were resilient,” Eguavoen told NFF TV.

“They worked hard in such an atmosphere in Kumasi and so I think it was a fair result.

“We have to take the game to Ghana. We tried to take it to them on Friday but they were tough at the back especially the defence led by Amartey, he was good.

“But we had two, three clear chances we should have buried but we were just not calm enough in the box. But we will try to work on how we’ll give those final balls to our attackers to have easy passage to goal.”

Meanwhile, the Black Stars have left the shores of the country on Monday morning for Abuja. The team will train today at 17:00GMT.

The return leg is scheduled for the Moshood Abiola Stadium at 17:00GMT on Tuesday.

The winner of that tie will book one of Africa’s five slots for the 2022 World Cup to be held in Qatar later this year.