Ikechukwu Vincent Ezenwa (born 16 October 1988) is a Nigerian former professional

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby lea ...

who played as a

goalkeeper In many team sports that involve scoring goal (sport), goals, the goalkeeper (sometimes termed goaltender, netminder, GK, goalie, or keeper) is a designated player charged with directly preventing the opposing team from scoring by blocking or i ...

Club career

Ezenwa began his football professional career with Ocean Boys before moved to Heartland FC in July 2008. He moved to Ifeanyi Ubah FC in 2016. Contract End in 2017. He has then completed a move to

Enyimba Aba is a city in southeastern Nigeria. It lies along the west bank of the Aba River and is at the intersection of roads leading to settlements such as Port Harcourt, Owerri, Umuahia, Ikot Ekpene, and Ikot-Abasi. Aba was established by t ...

. Contract End in 2018. He moved on to join Katsina United on 1 January 2019. One of his respected goalkeeper trainer who impacted greatly to his career is former

Sunshine Stars Sunshine Stars Football Club is a Nigerian football club based in Akure. They play in the top division in Nigerian football, the Nigerian Premier League. Their home stadium is the 5,000-capacity Akure Township Stadium. Sunshine Stars FC drew an a ...

Coach, Daramola Nicholas Akinsehinwa between the year 2013 to 2016 during his playing time with

Sunshine Stars F.C. Sunshine Stars Football Club is a Nigerian Association football, football club based in Akure. They play in the top division in Nigerian football, the Nigerian Premier League. Their home stadium is the 5,000-capacity Akure Township Stadium. Sunsh ...

and this great development to his potentials made the Nigeria Super Eagles call-up possible by which Ikechukwu Ezenwa was part of the Nigeria squad at the

2014 World Cup The 2014 FIFA World Cup was the 20th FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial world championship for men's national football teams organised by FIFA. It took place in Brazil from 12 June to 13 July 2014, after the country was awarded the hosting ri ...

International career

He was a member of the Nigeria U-23 at the

2008 Summer Olympics The 2008 Summer Olympics (), officially the Games of the XXIX Olympiad () and officially branded as Beijing 2008 (), were an international multisport event held from 8 to 24 August 2008, in Beijing, China. A total of 10,942 athletes fro ...

, featuring in the qualifier games. He got the call up to the Nigeria Super Eagles in 2015 under the authority of Coach

Sunday Oliseh Sunday Ogochukwu Oliseh (born 14 September 1974) is a Nigerian football manager and former footballer who played as a defensive midfielder. Physical yet technically gifted, he played for top European clubs including Ajax, Borussia Dortmund and J ...

. Following the injury of Nigeria's first choice goalkeeper

Carl Ikeme Carl Onora Ikeme (born 8 June 1986) is a former professional footballer who played as a goalkeeper. He spent his entire career at Wolverhampton Wanderers, making 207 appearances across all competitions. He was part of their teams that won the C ...

he was called up to be part of the squad in the World cup and Nations cup qualifications by

Super Eagles The Nigeria national football team represents Nigeria in Men's international football. Governed by the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF), they are three-time Africa Cup of Nations ( AFCON) winners, with their most recent title in 2013. In Febr ...

coach

Gernot Rohr Gernot Rohr (born 28 June 1953) is a German professional football coach and former player who is currently the manager of the Benin national team. Managerial career In 1996, he managed Girondins de Bordeaux to the UEFA Cup final, where they l ...

and given the number 1 jersey replacing Ikeme as first choice goalkeeper of the Super Eagles. Ezenwa showed some class of keeping during Nigeria's back to back matches against the ‘indomitable lions’ of

Cameroon Cameroon, officially the Republic of Cameroon, is a country in Central Africa. It shares boundaries with Nigeria to the west and north, Chad to the northeast, the Central African Republic to the east, and Equatorial Guinea, Gabon, and the R ...

in the 2018 FIFA World Cup qualifiers. In May 2018, he was named in Nigeria's preliminary 30 man

squad In military terminology, a squad is among the smallest of Military organization, military organizations and is led by a non-commissioned officer. NATO and United States, U.S. doctrine define a squad as an organization "larger than a fireteam, ...

for the

2018 World Cup The 2018 FIFA World Cup was the 21st FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial world championship for national football teams organized by FIFA. It took place in Russia from 14 June to 15 July 2018, after the country was awarded the hosting rights in l ...

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

Career statistics

International

:''Statistics accurate as of match played 30 June 2019.''

References

External links

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Player Profile
1988 births Living people People from Yenagoa Nigerian men's footballers Men's association football goalkeepers Footballers at the 2008 Summer Olympics Olympic footballers for Nigeria Olympic silver medalists for Nigeria Heartland F.C. players Nigeria men's international footballers Nigeria men's under-20 international footballers Sunshine Stars F.C. players Ocean Boys F.C. players Sharks F.C. players Olympic medalists in football Medalists at the 2008 Summer Olympics Footballers at the 2016 Summer Olympics 2018 FIFA World Cup players Ifeanyi Ubah F.C. players Enyimba F.C. players Nigeria Professional Football League players 2019 Africa Cup of Nations players 2016 African Nations Championship players Nigeria men's A' international footballers 2018 African Nations Championship players 21st-century Nigerian sportsmen {{Nigeria-footy-goalkeeper-stub