By Sulayman Bah
Spanish club Atletico Beleares have backed the possible inclusion of star striker Nuha Marong to Gambia’s national team
Club president Ingo Volckmann has thrown his weight behind move to hand his striker a first senior cap with The Gambia after Scorpions’ coach Tom Saintfiet turned up to watch the starlet a month ago.
‘Nuha is a nice guy and so we want to give him the chance,’ he said.
‘For Nuha, an international match would be a great thing which would not be so nice for us, as he would miss one or two games,’ he states.
The Scorpions face a make or break tie when they return visit to the North African giants whose gaffer Belmadi hinted he could possibly use the game to test untried talents including local-based players having already qualified for the Nations Cup.
And ahead of the clash, coach Tom Saintfiet is looking to bolster his squad with more striking options and an insider at the Gambia Football Federation hints the Belgian has plans of integrating Spain-based Nuha Marong into his setup.
The Belgian even flew out to Palma Majorca, south coast of Mallorca, to meet the striker.
Nuha in 2016 voiced interest to Foroyaa Sport about playing for Gambia.
Efforts were initially being made to secure the 25-year-old’s services during Sang Ndong’s tenure as Scorpions coach but the process got delayed.
Born in Spain, the tall attacker qualifies to play for Gambia through his parents despite having represented the European country at U-17, U-19 and U-20 categories.
If Marong does play against the Desert Foxes, it will send number of strikers available to Tom soaring to five namely, Assan Ceesay, Musa Barrow, Lamin Jallow, Adama Jammeh and Baboucarr Jobe.
In as much Gambia would fancy going on a rampage in Algiers, the development could mean Tunisia-based Adama Jammeh making way for Marong giving Tom, by the look of things, appears to have little interest in summoning China-based goal-getter Bubacarr Trawally.
Plying his trade in Spain’s third tier with Atletico Baleares, Nuha has had stints with former Laliga outfits Elche and CA Osasuna.
He was at fourth division side CD Castellion before joining Baleares on free transfer.
