Coach of the Flying Eagles, John Obuh, has said he has in his head the 23 players likely to make his final squad for the African Youth Championship in Algeria.
March 6 is the deadline for the AYC finalists to submit their final 21-man, but Nigeria plans to send through their final squad ahead of this date.
Obuh said: “I have a good idea of my squad.
“I have about 23 players and so just need to drop two of them and we have the final squad.
“I will now have to concentrate on these players now.”
There are currently 29 players at the team’s training camp in Tunisia, with only Denmark-based Edafe Egbedi still being expected.
Obuh said the Tunisia loss on Thursday was an eye opener for him as he tried to give all squad members a chance to stake a claim on the main squad.
He said: “It was a test game that showed the players who are ready for the tournament and those who are not.
“We had a better game when I introduced some of the players I have played more often before.
“But the damage had been done by the first set of players and those who replaced them were not relaxed and were too anxious to score but they could not.”
Meanwhile, the warm up game against Esperance has been moved.
The Flying Eagles will now play their second warm-up game in Tunisia against Esperance on Saturday by 11am.
The match was earlier fixed for Sunday afternoon.
The Nigeria U20s are expected to play their main team for the match as the countdown for the 2013 AYC has begun.
Esperance are most likely to line-up 18-year-old forward, Emeka Emerum, who has just signed a four-year contract with the two-time African champions.
Esperance U20 and Club Africain have also been lined up to test the readiness of the Flying Eagles for the AYC.
The Nigeria youth team will begin their title defence on March 17 against Mali in Oran.
Both teams clashed in the semi-finals of the 2011 AYC in South Africa with the Flying Eagles 2-0 winners.
Nigeria’s other Group B games are on March 20 against Gabon and three days later against DR Congo.
The semi-finalists will represent Africa at the FIFA U20 World Cup in Turkey in June.
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