The Nigeria Football Federation has appealed to kidnappers of Nigerian midfielder Christian Obodo to free the player and save the nation’s football family of anguish.

Obodo, who plays his club football for Udinese FC in Italy, was reportedly abducted in Warri, Delta State on Saturday morning, hours before the Super Eagles’ 2014 FIFA World Cup Brazil qualifying match
against Malawi in Blantyre.

When report of the incident filtered into Blantyre, capital of Malawi on Saturday night, NFF President, Alhaji Aminu Maigari was thunderstruck.

When he recovered, he said: “This is a sad thing. Christian Obodo served this country patriotically and without blame when he played for the Senior National Team, Super Eagles. We know that if not for injuries that have blighted his international career, he probably would have been with us here in Malawi for this match.

“The only thing we can do is to appeal passionately to the kidnappers to let him go. He is a young patriot who should not go through this kind of experience.

“On behalf of the Nigeria football family, I urge the abductors to release Christian Obodo from this untoward experience and let us smile again.”

The petite but lion-hearted midfielder played for Nigeria at the 2006 African Cup of Nations in Egypt, and was in reckoning of then Coach Samson Siasia during the qualifying campaign for the 2012 African Cup of Nations finals.