Imama reveals Amuneke inspired him to guide U23s past Libya

Coach Imama, your team won 4-0 to qualify for the next round of the U23 AFCON. It was a sweet victory for the team in Asaba.

All glory to God and praise to the players, who duly responded. Kudos to them, they are one team who listen, they proved to me that it pays to listen.

It is difficult to cancel a two-goal deficit from the first game in Tunisia. So , what was actually going through your mind hours to this crucial match?

If you ask the players, I told them it was the easiest scoreline to cancel. All we needed to do is to score one goal, score another goal and we need to score one goal again because you can never score two goals at the same time, all we needed to do was to score one goal, one after another.

Tanzania have returned to the Africa Cup of Nations after a 39-year absence and it was a Nigerian coach, Emmanuel Amuneke, who qualified the Taifa Stars of Tanzania to the AFCON. How did you take this feat?

I am so proud of coach Emmanuel Amuneke’s achievement. When the news broke, I was so excited that I screamed inside the team bus. Then I knew it was a point of contact for  me, that if Amuneke did it, I knew it was going to happen for me. He did it with three goals and God blessed me with four goals. I congratulate Amuneke.

Your team will now face either Kenya or Sudan in the last round of the qualifiers of the U23 AFCON. How do you intend to approach this knowing fully your greatest undoing was that the training camp did not start early?

I believe it’s the duty of the federation to see what our short comings are and act on them. We have to wait to know who will qualify because that’s going to our next target.

I just finished a meeting with the players and told them it is not yet over, we have a pressing task ahead of us. This victory is sweet, we danced well, but then it is momentary. We have to go to the next game which will qualify  us to the AFCON.