Sunshine confident of Champions League upset

Saturday’s CAF Champions League
semi-final between Ahly and Sunshine
Stars will match the six-time winners
versus the competition debutants.
And Nigeria’s Sunshine insist they
could upset the form books as the
pressure will be on the Egyptian
champions to ensure they stop them
from reaching the final of Africa’s
foremost annual club competition.
"We are not under pressure to beat Al
Ahly because everybody expects us to
lose considering the pedigree of both
teams. They are under pressure as
they will want to enhance their
ratings,” top Sunshine official Mike
Idoko told reporter
“We know who they are, but we are
set to go all out to get victory on
Saturday.
“The spirit in camp is high and the
boys are ready to go all out to win. We
are aware of the burden we are
carrying on our shoulders and we
won't let Nigerians down.”
Skipper Godfrey Oboabona is likely to
miss this clash after he was
suspended for the final Group A clash
at Esperance of Tunisia.
“We are fully prepared to win this
match. It won’t be easy because
Esperance taught us a lesson when
they came down and beat us 2-0 at
our home ground,” said the versatile
Oboabona.
“I’m confident the team will win, but
I’m worried about the number of
goals we will score because goals
really matter in a situation like this.”
However, their preparations for this
match were disrupted by a pay strike
by the players of the Akure club, who
also reached the last four on their
debut in the CAF Confederation Cup
last year.
“The strike won’t affect the team’s
performance because during the
strike we were training on our own
and so we are all fit and ready for the
game,” maintained Oboabona.
The Red Devils from Cairo finished top
of Group B with 11 points from six
matches, a point ahead of TP
Mazembe of DR Congo.
Their Nigerian opponents, on the
other hand, placed behind defending
champions Esperance on six points
from Group A following the
sensational expulsion of Tunisia’s
Etoile du Sahel for crowd trouble.
Sunshine striker Dele Olorundare is
the team’s top scorer in the campaign
with three goals, while the legendary
Mohamed Aboutrika has fired six
goals for Ahly.
Sunshine will be counting on their
resilience especially inside the Dipo
Dina International Stadium in Ijebu-
Ode to upstage the mighty Ahly.
Al Ahly will be without Egypt
international Emad Moteab due to a
kidney problem, but they will be
armed with the experience of
Aboutrika, who has been declared fit
after a recent ankle complaint,
Mohammed Barakat and Hossam
Ghali.