Rohr: Eagles physically and mentally ready for Croatia

- Nigeria open their 2018 World Cup campaign against Croatia at the Kaliningrand Stadium on Saturday

- Both sides will be meeting for the first time in a competitive encounter this weekend

- Meanwhile, Gernot Rohr has insisted that his players are aware of what is at stake in that encounter

Super Eagles technical adviser Gernot Rohr says his players are ‘physically and mentally’ ready for their Russia 2018 opening Group D clash against Croatia on Saturday, June 16.

The Super Eagles are in the same group as the European giants, Argentina and Iceland and they will be hoping to surpass their second-round stage record this time.

Rohr during the team’s press conference earlier in the day claims they have corrected their errors in their last two test games, adding that they are not in the mood to play second fiddle at the Kaliningrand Stadium.

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“We are looking forward to the match with a lot of optimism. It will be a tough one, but we are physically and mentally ready.

“We had quality preparatory matches and trained twice at our final camp in Austria, and since arriving in Essentuki, we have done some useful tactical preparation.

“It is important to start well in a good tournament like this, and that is what we hope to do on Saturday,” Rohr told the world media on Thursday.

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The Super Eagles flew into the Kaliningrad Khrabrovo Airport on Thursday evening from Essentuki, about 48 hours to the clash with Croatia at the 35,000 –capacity Kaliningrad Stadium.

Also, the captain of the team John Obi Mikel insists that Nigeria must be at their best to get a positive result against the Croats at the end of the match on Saturday evening.

The China based midfielder says his side’s group is probably the toughest of all eight groups in the tournament, and again claims that being grouped in the ‘group of death’

“It is the dream of every footballer to play at the FIFA World Cup and we have to live that dream on Saturday. Croatia is a very good team with a lot of top class players and we have to be at our very best against them.

“This group is probably the toughest in the tournament; everyone is calling it the ‘group of death’. That is the motivation.

“We have given ourselves the target of coming out of this group just like we did in the African qualifying group that everyone gave the same tag.

“As our coach has said, we worked hard at both the camp in Austria and since we got to the team base camp in Essentuki.

“Our Football Federation also did well to get us to prepare in very good places devoid of distraction and now, it is our responsibility to do the nation proud by starting well against Croatia.”

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The 2018 edition of the competition will mark Nigeria’s sixth appearance at the FIFA World Cup finals since they made their debut at the 1994 finals in the USA.

Super Eagles are the only African team to have gone that far that many times. This was in 1994, 1998 and 2014. The team failed to emerge from the group stage in 2002 and 2010.

The only time Nigeria has missed football’s biggest showpiece in the last quarter –century was in 2006, when a head-to-head rule knocked out the Eagles despite finishing on equal points and superior goals to Angola – which was enough to guarantee qualification in normal situations.

Legit.ng previously reported that Argentina captain Lionel Messi has said he does not know much about the Super Eagles of Nigeria ahead of the World Cup.

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Both sides are set to clash in the final match of Group D on June 29 in a match that could decide the group's supremacy.

Mikel Obi led his teammates to a 4-2 victory against the Seleccion last November and the charismatic Messi was not present in the match.

And the Argentina captain disclosed that despite scoring a brace against the West Africans in the last World Cup in Brazil he still knows little about Gernot Rohr's side.

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Source: Legit.ng