Head coach of 2018 AITEO Cup finalists Rivers Angels; Edwin Okon has insisted that his side is not distracted by the series of protests against them, declaring that his team “is too big to play unregistered player” in the competitions they partake in.
Okon spoke with www.aclsports.com shortly after his side humiliated Confluence Queens 3-0 in a Nigeria Women Premier League game decided at the Yakubu Gowon Stadium in Port Harcourt on Wednesday.
The victory took Angels back to the top of Group A of the NWPL and on the right track for another league and cup double triumph.
“The league is very very tight at this level and we don’t need to drop the three points at this level,” began Okon to www.aclsports.com
“I don’t think of any other team. I think of what to do day by day in my own team and that is what has been helping us.”
Rivers Angels won the Women’s Cup competition also sponsored by AITEO last year. The Jewel of Rivers are once again in the final this year but are having a protest hanging around their neck from their semi final victims, Bayelsa Queens.
The eligibility of attacker Alice Ogebe is being questioned by the Bayelsa state government sponsored side and that follows another protest which Angels won after their quarter final fixture against Sunshine Queens. Okon is adamant the protests are just a mere way of distracting his team.
“The protests are part of distractions but I wouldn’t let it be what they think. As a coach, as a manager and as management, we just have to think ahead.
“All the protests against the team, in the first place, Rivers Angels is too big to play unregistered players in either the league or AITEO Cup. If it’s not our property, we won’t dare. So, I just see it as distraction but we just have to remain focused on that level,” said a confident Okon.
The protest is expected to be looked into before the end of this week and should Angels win again, they will face Ibom Angels in the repeat of last year’s final next Tuesday at the Samson Siasia Stadium in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State capital.
