The Nigeria U20 team, the Flying Eagles, who are preparing for next year’s Africa Youth Championships to be staged in Senegal, gave a commendable performance on Thursday as they defeated their opponents, Jamba Academy of Kaduna, 4-1 in their first test match.

The match was played at the Ahmadu Bello Stadium in Kaduna with a sizeable crowd on hand to see the new-look Flying Eagles team being assembled by Coach Manu Garba who conquered the world with the Golden Eaglets.

The goals for the Flying Eagles in Thursday’s friendly game came first off the boots of Wasiu Jimoh, who blasted in a free kick in the 8th minute of the game.

The Nigeria U20 team hard as they tried could not get another goal till the 55th minute this time through Israel Emmanuel.

Mathias Kato did pull a goal back for Jamba but Ifeanyi Matthew scored twice from the spot to end the tie 4-1 in favour of the Flying Eagles.

Speaking after his team’s victory, Mr. Garba expressed satisfaction with the level of display of his boys even though he equally admitted that match rustiness did not allow for optimum use of the other several chances created.

“We created many chances to score, but we failed to take most of them,” Manu said. “Probably the problem may be that we have been on break for over three months and so many of these players are now match rusty. But in a proper game we may not create as many such chances and so the more reason why we must take most of our chances now.”

After Thursday’s bright start, the Flying Eagles will play a second test game against Standard FC of Zaria on Saturday morning at the same venue.

Meanwhile, the Flying Eagles coach has invited three players from Jamba Academy to train with his team from Friday after they impressed in today’s test game.

The invited trio are midfielder Peter Bala, defender Jankasa Adams and forward Rabah Isiaku.