Enyimba Football Club produced a clinical performance to outclass Abia Warriors 4-1 in a thrilling Nigeria Professional Football League fixture at the Okigwe Stadium on Monday morning.
The fixture, which began at the Umuahia Township Stadium on Sunday evening but was called off following crowd violence; turned into an exciting five-goal spectacle upon resumption in Okigwe on Monday.
Stanley Dimgba kept his feet on the pedals of his fine scoring form, controlling Cyril Olisema’s chipped pass to send in a low strike and give Enyimba the lead four minutes before the interval.
Three minutes later, youngster Anayo Iwuala spearheaded a swift break to set up Victor Mbaoma, who picked his spot from the edge of the box, handing Fatai Osho’s side a two-goal lead at the break.
The visitors were made to weather sustained pressure at the restart – with Timothy Danladi and Abiodun Adebayo holding strong at center-back – but looked lethal on the break, and it was from one of such that Iwuala squashed hopes of a comeback when he finished off Olisema’s exquisite pass for his first goal since joining the People’s Elephant this season.
Dimgba then netted his brace six minutes later with a calm finish from Dare Olatunji’s long ball.
Yakub Hammed pulled one back for the hosts, but it proved too little to put any dent on Enyimba’s fourth straight league win.
FATAI OSHO’S POST MATCH REACTION
We are quite happy bearing in mind what happened in Umuahia yesterday. A lot of unfortunate things happened. The supporters were attacked, the club chairman was attacked and there is a way this affected the players. So we tried to talk to the players so that they would overcome that.
It’s not really an easy thing to do, and beyond that it’s not really good for our football but we are here today. We are quite happy that the players were able to overcome that and turn up their A performance.
ANAYO IWUALA’S POST MATCH REACTION
I’m happy, very excited. Did play some couple of matches although coming in as a sub. This is my second start for Enyimba since coming to this club and getting my first goal is a very great one for me. I’m happy. As an attacker I think I should be getting more goals. That’s what I’ve been working for.
We just want to keep winning, no matter where – home or away. We just want to get the three points and get out of there, that’s just our main point.
It was a derby game, and of course we had to give our all after the incident of yesterday. We had to play for the chairman and for those who were being wounded yesterday, we just had to give our all. We didn’t play for ourselves alone.
CYRIL OLISEMA’S POST MATCH REACTION
Yesterday we saw what happened and we were not really happy and this victory we are dedicating to our fans and our able chairman.
You can see the character is different. You know we have a very important match that will be coming up on the 1st (of March) so that’s why we have to continue winning so that it will give us more motivation in our match coming on the 1st.
I know it’s a very big game against a very big side also, and we pray to God in our remaining matches we will continue in the same character like this.
