Former Super Eagles center back Sam Sodje has highlighted the steps he is planning to take in his bid to convince his nephew and godson, Tai Sodje to commit his international future to Nigeria over his country of birth.

With 17 goals in 16 matches for Manchester City U18s, Sodje is the outright leading scorer in this season's U18 Premier League and it's only a matter of time before the English Football Association hand him a call-up to one of their youth teams.

In truth, the Anglo-Nigerian wonderkid is leaning towards representing England at the moment as he was born and raised in the country and has friends in the Young Lions setup.

"Tai's mom is English, his dad is Nigerian, he's got uncles who played for Nigeria," Sam Sodje said to allnigeriasoccer.com.

"It's different for Tai, he has never been to Nigeria while I grew up in Nigeria even though I was born in London, I kind of knew I was going to play for Nigeria.

"When it comes to Tai, all Tai talks about is he has been brought up in England, but he's got uncles and his dad is Nigerian so he's got a big part of him that he's Nigerian.

"He's my godson, I speak to him every time and I have told him how special it is for him to play for Nigeria and I 'm sure he loves to play for Nigeria.

"All I want to do is sometime bring him to Nigeria, visit Nigeria, visit the national team and see how passionate the fans are and I'm sure he'll buy into it.

"He's fully Nigerian but mom is English so he has a chance to play for England but my own view Nigeria is going to be his destination, hopefully."

Sam Sodje's sibling, Efe was a member of the Super Eagles squad to the 2002 World Cup and started matches against Argentina and England during the tournament in Asia.

Ifeanyi Emmanuel

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