Nigeria’s Under-23 coach, Austin Eguaveon faced with herculean task of qualifying Nigeria for the London 2012 Olympics has been psyching up his players in camp against the background of failures that have stalked Nigerians teams in continental contests.

The team holds hope for Nigerian football fans, after the Eagles failed to qualify for the Nations Cup. Last week the Falcons were dismissed from the London 2012 Olympics by Cameroon women, while Nigerian clubsides Enyimba and Sunshine took a tumbling in club championships. Eguaveon admitted that these poor runs of result have put pressure on the team.

The coach and the Nigeria Football Federation technical committee met during the week to review Eguaveon’s European tour and also to work out plans for the team’s successful campaign at the African qualifying tournament to be staged in Morocco from November 26.

The Olympic Eagles have been drawn in group B alongside Algeria, Morocco, Senegal and Nigeria. Egypt are in Group A with Cote’ d Ivoire, South Africa and Gabon. Two teams will get automatic qualification while the third will be in another play-off.

“Eguaveon has been talking to the players about the need to be focused. There is pressure to perform and he continues to psyche them up for the task ahead,” said a team official.