The Chelsea midfielder is 29-year-old but FIFA rules for the competition allow participating countries to include three overaged players in their squads and our correspondent reliably learnt that Mikel was one of the three stars Coach Samson Siasia was planning to add to his team.
Several Super Eagles players who are not within the age bracket including Mikel have been linked with the U-23 team as overage players that would be taken to Rio, Brazil and the Chelsea star seems to be the number one on Siasia’s mind.
New Telegraph learnt that the coach visited Mikel at the Stamford Bridge, London over the weekend to discuss his Olympics programme, a strong indication of his willingness to have the former Lyn Oslo star work with him on the assignment.
A source told our correspondent that Siasia was ready to strip current captain of the U-23 team Azubuike Okechukwu of the title and offer same to Mikel as part of the plans for the games.
“It is true that coach Siasia was in London to meet with Mikel,” a source informed our correspondent.
“He went there to discuss his programme with the player. Mikel is not the only one he is to see, he will meet with several other Europe- based players he plans to work with.
He also wants to get the assurances from those players that their clubs would release them for the games before he comes up with his final list. He is certainly going to have Mikel as captain of the side and the two of them are ready to work together once again.”
Mikel was supposed to be the anchor man for the Nigerian team that reached the final of the competition in Beijing 2008 Games but the player was excluded by Siasia who was also in charge of that side because the midfielder failed to honour invitations during the qualifiers.
The player and coach appear to have settled their differences after Siasia convinced Ahmed Musa to relinquish the captaincy of the Super Eagles to Mikel during his short spell as Super Eagles interim coach.
Mikel again? Nothing special
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