Aiyegbeni: I’m just ready to go

Former Super Eagles striker, Yakubu Aiyegbeni, cannot wait to start banging in the goals for his new club Reading saying he’s “just ready to go”.

Aiyegbeni completed a move to the Championship side until the end of the season on transfer deadline day.

The 32-year-old heads to the Madejski Stadium in good spirit.

“It feels good to be back in England and it feels good to play for Reading Football Club,” he told Reading FC Player.

“I’m so happy to be here. I’ve been training so hard in Qatar and I’m feeling fit, I’m just ready to go. After two and a half years away from England I’m back again – English football is some of the best in the world, both the Premier League and the Championship.

“I have played in this league twice – with Leicester and Portsmouth and I want to try to help the team. I just need to get on the pitch and give it my best, hopefully I can score more goals and help the team.”

Aiyegbeni was keen to pay tribute to Steve Clarke, who alongside the club’s owners was instrumental to making the transfer possible.

“Without him (Clarke) I don’t think I’d be here today, thanks to the owners too – they worked so hard to bring me here. The club have fantastic training pitches and a big stadium. The players and staff are good people and they have already made me feel at home. I am going to give it my best and we will see how it goes.”

Aiyegbeni’s goal scoring history in depth

Here are some statistics on the striker culled from the club’s website.

• With 96 goals, he is the joint second highest African goal scorer in Premier League history, level with Emmanuel Adebayor, behind only Chelsea’s Didier Drogba.
• He scored a hat-trick on his Champions League debut in a 3-0 win for Israeli side Maccabi Haifa at home to Olympiakos in September 2002.
• With 21 goals, he is the third highest all-time scorer for the Nigerian national team, ahead of Obafemi Martins, Julius Agahowa, Jay Jay Okocha and Nwankwo Kanu.
• He scored four minutes into his first start for Pompey.
• As a 17-year-old, he was part of Nigeria’s squad for the Olympic Games in Sydney in 2000, which drew with Andrea Pirlo’s Italy to reach the knockout stages.
• In 2003-4 he scored 16 Premier League goals, the same number as Michael Owen and Nicolas Anelka that season. The following year he matched Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink and Jermain Defoe with 13 top flight goals.
• In his first season at Middlesbrough he beat Didier Drogba’s Premier League tally and 12 goals in 2006-7 saw him score as many as Dimitar Berbatov. Then, at Everton, he matched Robbie Keane and bettered Carlos Tevez’s total with 15 Premier League goals in 2007-8.
• With Blackburn he also scored freely, firing his best record of 17 Premier League goals in 2011-12 to beat Mario Balotelli, Papiss Cisse and Demba Ba in the rankings.
• He has represented Nigeria in four African Cup of Nations tournaments.
• Featuring in the 2010 World Cup Finals with the Super Eagles, Yakubu played against Argentina’s Lionel Messi and Angel Di Maria and scored a penalty to earn a point for his country against South Korea in their final group game.
• Middlesbrough reportedly recouped their £7.5m paid to Portsmouth in 2005 for the striker, by selling him for £11.5m to Everton two years later.
• His first Premier League goal was scored past Manchester City’s David Seaman in August 2003. His most recent Premier League goal was scored at Stamford Bridge on his final appearance for Blackburn in May 2012.
• The Nigerian has scored against eight different England international goalkeepers (David Seaman, Rob Green, Paul Robinson, Richard Wright, Scott Carson, Joe Hart, David James and John Ruddy).
• His first Premier League hat-trick (he has scored four in total to date) saw him score four times past Mark Schwarzer’s Middlesbrough on the final day of his first top flight season.
• He has also found a way past the likes of Brad Friedel, Edwin Van Der Sar, Jens Lehmann, Shay Given, Petr Cech, Heurelho Gomes, Woichech Szcezny and David De Gea.
• Yakubu has played twice before at Madejski Stadium, scoring for Middlesbrough on the opening day of the Royals’ first ever top flight season before playing a part in Leicester City’s 3-1 defeat here in April 2011.