Super Eagles head coach Augustine Eguavoen has lamented his decision to leave out Chideria Ejuke in the team’s list for Sunday’s 2021 Africa Cup of Nations round of 16 match against Tunisia in Garoua.

Nigeria crashed out of the tournament after a 1-0 defeat to Tunisia.

Ejuke, who is one of the 14 Nigeria debutants at AFCON in Cameroon, was not dressed for the game and Eguavoen regretted his decision to omit the CSKA Moscow of Russia winger out of the squad, stressing that the mercurial striker would have changed the tide in favour of Nigeria with his tricks.

Eguavoen added that the decision to exclude Ejuke was not intentional, revealing that he had talked with the players that the team would be rotated to give every player a chance to play in the tournament.

“The only mistake I made was leaving Ejuke out of the team on Sunday, maybe he would have done something different with his tricks. Although, I have talked to the players that we would be rotating the team to give everyone a chance to play. I take responsibility for whatever that happened at the tournament,” Eguavoen said.

Ejuke only tasted action twice at AFCON 2021 tournament after coming in as a second-half substitute against Egypt and started the last group game against Guinea Bissau.

Source: The Nation Newspaper