Enyimba In Good Start, Beat Buffles 3-0 In Champions League

Two-time CAF Champions League winners, Enyimba, on Sunday defeated Buffles du Borgou Fc of Benin Republic 3-0 in Aba on Sunday. The former Nigerian champions waited till late into the second half to establish a commanding lead having scored a solitary goal going into the break.

The match was the first leg, preliminary round of the CAF Champions League at the Enyimba Sports Stadium.

Daniel Etor, Kingsley Sokari and Chinonso Okonkwo scored the goals for Enyimba with the last two coming in the final ten minutes of the match.

The Aba club began the match in the best possible manner. Attacking winger, Etor side-footed the ball into an empty net  to give Enyimba the lead after Peter Onyekachi had done all the hard work on the left flank.

The Peoples Elephant also blew scoring chances. The quartet of Etor, Onyekachi, Andrew Abalogu and Okonkwo were all guilty of misses in a first half that was one-way traffic.

On one of such occasion, Okonkwo was played through on goal with the Buffles goalkeeper Soffo Souradjou at his mercy. But the striker took the wrong option of passing to Onyekachi, who had ran into an offside position.

Enyimba got within doubling their lead before the break when Idris Aloma was through on goal but the Buffles keeper went down quick to save off the feet of the left-back.

Okonkwo started the second half with a miss after Kingsley Sokari slipped him through in the box.

Etor also joined Okonkwo by failing to convert in the early minutes of the second while substitute Nzube Anaezemba's screamer clipped the woodwork to the relief of Buffles goalkeeper.

Buffles got a sight of goal and nearly levelled the score with 20 minutes to full time. But Aloma's trailing leg saved Enyimba the blushes of conceding after dominating for longer spells.

In the 77th minute, Onyekachi was brought down in Buffles box and shockingly Anaezemba blasted the spot kick over the bar.

It was Sokari that made it 2-0 to Enyimba in the 83rd minute with a header from Bright Esieme's cross before Okonkwo also got his name among the scorers with a 90th minute goal to make it 3-0.

Enyimba will face Buffles in two weeks in Benin Republic in the return leg.


Line-ups

Enyimba: Chijioke Ejiogu; Idris Aloma, Chinedu Udoji, Emma Anyanwu, Bright Esieme; Sikiru Kamal, Sokari Kingsley, Abalogu Andrew, Etor Daniel, Peter Onyekachi, Chinonso Okonkwo

Subs: Femi Thomas; Markson Ojobo, Anaezemba Nzube, Abdulrazak Aliyu, Ezekiel Bassey, Solomon Tunde, Rafael Boumsong #CAFCL


Buffles du Borgou: Soffo Souradjou; Abdoulaye Quzinov, Mama Janni Moudachirou, Mohammed Hassane, Rahimi Kadri, Koto Razack, Bah-Yere Sanni Mama, Koudjrohede Gilchrist, Tesso Charles, Kola Raimi Kowiyou, Maman Fadyl

Subs: Kpossoudke Serge; Allowakinndu Simplice, Issifou Imorou Aminou, Adjai Moussa, Aziz Odjo, Fousseni Fahadou, Agognon Julien