Nigeria coach Salisu Yusuf has lauded his players character after playing to a 2-0 win aganist Sierra Leone in their 2017 WAFU Cup of Nations clash at the Cape Coast Sports Stadium in Ghana.

Yusuf says that the match was difficult but his players had an upbeat mindset that helped them eliminate Sierra Leone despite the few days that his team had to train together.

“We didn’t have training [except for] one day because we were so much concerned with the World Cup qualifiers against Cameroon,” he told the post-match press conference.

“It’s the most important. We have qualified for CHAN [African Nations Championship], so we had to take a risk that all our concentration will be on the World Cup first.

“It was a good decision and it was a good game, because we came here with the same squad that played Benin in the last CHAN qualifier and we played the same system.

“We had some good young players come in, but they cannot play because they never trained. All of them played a league match on Saturday and travelled long distances, so there was no recovery.

“The players have done very well, they have shown great character to survive this game,”Yusuf told Fox Sports.

Nigeria scored their goals from Moses Okoro and Moses Peter in the final five minutes of the tie, a win that see them progress into the group stage.