Following the unimpressive display of the Home-Based Super Eagles at the African Nations Championship, the President of the Nigerian Union in Western Cape, South Africa, Azu Okparaugo has said people should not write off the team yet.

He told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on telephone from Cape Town on Monday that in spite losing 1-2 to Mali in the opening match, the Eagles had the potential to come back to reckoning in the tournament.

 “The truth is that we trust Stephen Keshi and his team. We have a high regard and we believe in him. I know, yes they made a mistake, but, we are not writing them off.

“They are still our team. The Super Eagles have that history of coming back and coming back doing better and they proved it in AFCON last time.

“So, yes, we believe in them and we will not fail to support them. We will continue to support them, even better in the next match.

“And we believe they will do better. That they lost this first match does not mean that we will write them off. No, we trust them.

“The only thing now is that they have their work cut out for them. They need to work twice as hard to prove themselves.

“But the community in Cape Town will not relent in the support we give to them’’.

Okparaugo said Nigerians in Cape Town expected the Eagles to win the match against Mali as the boys had the requisite experience but might have had a lot of things that counted against them.

“It’s a learning call for them, it’s a bad start, the entire community was disappointed because of the fact that the loss put a lot of pressure on the team’’.

Okparaugo said Nigerians in South Africa were expecting a lot from the team in their next match.