Amaju Pinnick confirms Ejaria’s Nigeria switch

President, Nigeria Football Federation, Amaju Pinnick, has confirmed that Ovie Ejaria has committed his international future to Nigeria.

The midfielder, who is on loan at Readiong from EPL giants Liverpool, was born in England to Nigerian parents, which made him eligible to represent England or Nigeria at international level.

The youngster trained with the Nigerian U-17 team in 2013 before he accepted a call up to the England U-20 team in 2016 and made his debut on October 7, in a 3–1 win against Germany.

There has been a battle for the ownership of the player between England and Nigeria and the latter seems to have won after Pinnick was quoted saying by ESPN that the Reading player has agreed to play for the three-time African champions.

The NFF president added that Ejaria’s paperwork had been filed with world football’s governing body, FIFA.

“Yes, he has agreed to play for Nigeria,” Pinnick told ESPN.

“His documents have been sent to FIFA since.”

Ejaria, 22, is the latest player under current head coach, Gernot Rohr, to switch allegiance to Nigeria following in the footsteps of Dutch Eredivisie top scorer Cyriel Dessers and Bundesliga defender Kingsley Ehizibue, who are yet to make their debuts for the country due to the coronavirus pandemic.