Tomas Kalas scored the second international goal of his career, and second in his last three caps, as the Czech Republic recovered from a 4-0 shellacking by Australia to beat Nigeria 1-0 in a friendly in Austria on Tuesday afternoon.
Kalas found himself with a simple finish in a goal-mouth scramble halfway through the first-half to end his season on a good note before he heads off to vacation and tries to figure out what’s next for his career. The eternal loanee has made it clear that he’s actually done with all that, and now wants to settle down and play some solid Premier League football. Fulham may be interested, but Chelsea’s £10m asking price may prove too much.
In the other dugout, there are more immediate concerns. Nigeria now head off to the World Cup with two losses in two friendlies, with two of the three goals conceded coming from set pieces. In fact, both goalscorers in those instances, Gary Cahill for England and Kalas for the Czechs are Chelsea players! Mikel & Co will be hoping to not run across too many of those in Russia.
Victor Moses, as usual, started (and missed a great chance) for the Super Eagles, who played more or less their first-choice lineup, which meant that Kenneth Omeruo was an usued substitute. The match was also interrupted for 10 minutes by a deluge of biblical proportions in the second-half.
Nigeria begin their tough group stage with a game against Croatia in 10 days before facing Iceland and Argentina.