Lagos, Nigeria - Ex-Nigeria captain, Kanu, peps up team ahead of Rwanda clash. Former Super Eagles of Nigeria captain Nwankwo Kanu on Tuesday visited the training camp of the home-based team in the capital city of Abuja to pep up the players, ahead of their match against Rwanda 29 Feb. in the qualifying series for the 2013 Africa Cup of Nations in South Africa

'You have to have confidence in yourself and to be determined and not be shaky because some of your brothers are coming from Europe to join the team,' he said during the visit.

'They all started from here like you and you should show them that you can play as ell as they can and demonstrate it when you engage Rwanda in Kigali,” he said.

Responding on behalf of the team, captain Chigozie Agbim thanked Kanu for finding the time to visit the players in training and assured that the team would not let him and the Nigerian public down.

Nigeria team coach Stephen Keshi is expected to pick 11 players from the home-based team to join another 11 abroad-based professionals for the match, to be played in the Rwandan capital, Kigali.

Nigeria is taking the match very seriously after missing out of the just-concluded 2012 Africa Cup of Nations in Gabon and Equatorial Guinea.

The Nigeria-Rwanda tie is one of the 14 matches to be played on home-and-away basis in the second round of the qualifiers for the 2013 Nations Cup.

The 14 winners will advance to the third round, where they will be joined by the 16 finalists in the 2012 competition for a total of 30 teams.

At the third and final qualifying stage, the 15 aggregate winners of the two-leg matches will qualify for the finals of the 2013 tournament, joining host and automatic qualifier South Africa.

Pana 22/02/2012