Super Eagles’ Coach, Eric Chelle, has said that the team must improve in two key areas to become a force to reckon with in world football that Nigerians want them to be.

Nigeria defeated Jamaica 5-4 after a penalty shootout to win the 2025 Unity Cup on Saturday at the Gtech Community Stadium, Brentford, England. The regular period ended 2-2.

But despite the win, which followed Nigeria’s earlier 2-1 defeat of Ghana last Thursday, Chelle said the Super Eagles were far from the team that others used to dread, adding, however, that the ingredients needed to build a top team were available in his squad.

Speaking during the post-match conference, Chelle said: “There are many things that we have to work on in our game.

“In this game, we made two mistakes and we need to improve and step up in our goal to qualify for the World Cup.

“In this team, there are many good strikers and wingers; there are lots of great players in the team. The most important thing for me is that we try to play together in defense and attack.

“We need to improve mentally to become a warrior squad on the pitch. We need to improve physically and technically, there are many things to work on.”

He said the good news is that the team have been adapting to his pattern, adding that the Super Eagles have learnt to move from one formation to another depending on the match situation.

“I can say that my team and players have a great spirit, and I am happy about that. If you watch the game, you will see that we started with diamond and after that, we played 4-2-3-1, and after that, we played 4-4-2.”

He acknowledged that the presence of some new players made cohesion difficult, saying that the long European season also affected the players during the Unity Cup competition.

“We had a difficult time bringing our players together because they played a long season and were tired…,” the coach said, adding that the team would work towards meeting the country’s expectations in the concluding part of the 2026 World Cup qualifying series in September.

On the team’s forthcoming friendly game against Russia on June 6, the coach said his side is almost ready for the tough game against the Europeans.

He said: “Our goal is to win every game – so we’re going to play them for a win. This is my speech when I talk to the players, we need to show the world of football what our state of mind is. We want to win against Russia and come back to Abuja with the win.”

Meanwhile, Russia’s Manager, Valery Karpin, has dismissed suggestions that his side will meet a weakened side following the absence of star players Victor Osimhen, Alex Iwobi, Calvin Bassey and Ademola Lookman.

Chelle did not pick the trio for the Unity Cup and the friendly in Moscow as he wanted to give other players an opportunity to prove themselves.

Despite these absences, Karpin said that Nigeria remain a strong team capable of beating anybody on their day. He told Komsomolskaya Pravda: “It doesn’t change our preparation at all. Without Osimhen and Lukman, there will be other equally good footballers.

“Now there are many media outlets, bloggers, Internet broadcasts… They write: “Nigeria is bringing a second team” only because two leaders didn’t come.”

He disclosed that his own squad is also missing several key names, saying: “Then we can also say that we are bringing a second team. We don’t have Golovin, we don’t have Zakharyan. Golovin, Zakharyan, Barinov, Diveev were not in the match against Zambia.

“These are our main players, our stars. Safonov was not there. But no one is talking about this.” =========================