Nigeria, Costa Rica invited for Nehru Cup 2012 football tournament

AIFF is trying to get quite high-profile teams for Nehru Cup 2012 which is to be held in New Delhi between 16th to 26th August.

This being the 75th year of AIFF, Nehru Cup will be made a marquee event. Nigeria have received the invitation but nothing has been finalized and the AIFF is waiting for the nod from Nigerian Football Federation (NFF).

Speaking to ChannelsTV.com, an NFF official said,

There is a letter from India but the board has yet to discuss on Nigeria’s participation in the competition

But the NFF is looking positive about this and will be trying to use it as a practice tournament. The timing might be a problem as the foreign based players will be involved with their clubs in mid-August.

The NFF is interested in giving more opportunities to the Eagles to improve but we don’t want these to affect the programme on ground. It will be a good time for coach Stephen Keshi to assess the players from the domestic league.

NFF Official

Kushal Das has been quoted saying that the tournament might be a 5-6 team affair. But the teams will be fairly strong unlike previous 2 occasions.

The only team confirmed so far is Afghanistan. Other teams that have been invited are Thailand, Jordan, Costa Rica and Malaysia.