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Gimale Essacu
Rachael Keating

Essacu Named to U-23 Papua New Guinea National Team

| By: WIU Athletic Communications

The Leatherneck will compete in the Olympic Qualifying Tournament in Fiji from Sept. 21-Oct. 5.

Papua, New Guinea - Every soccer player across the world dreams of representing their home country at the international level. And for current Western Illinois men's soccer student-athlete Gimale Essacu, he will get that honor again. 

"It's a very humbling feeling to be able to represent your nation playing the sport you love," Essacu said. "There's a lot of pride and passion I feel when I play for my country so I'm very excited for this Olympic qualifiers to try and help my team get out of our group stages and see if we could compete with the best in the Oceania region."

Essacu was selected to the Papua New Guinea U-23 squad by head coach Percy Mataio earlier this September. A member of the 20-man squad, he will compete in the OFC Men's Olympic Qualifying Tournament in Fiji for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics from Sept. 21-Oct. 5. The Leatherneck also suited up for his home country in an Olympic Qualifier in 2015 that advanced to the semifinals. 
 
Gimale Essacu
     "This is my second Olympic qualifiers campaign, and I'm a lot older and a little wiser this time around, especially training every day here at     Western," he added. 

    Papua New Guinea is in Group B along with Fiji, Tonga and Vanuatu. Its first match of the qualifiers is set for Sunday (Sept. 22) against Vanuatu,     then Fiji on Wednesday (Sept. 25) and Tonga Saturday (Sept. 28).  

    This season, Essacu has logged 241 minutes in five appearances for the Leathernecks. He played a crucial role in preseason play as he assisted on     the game-winner versus UIS (Aug. 21) and scored the game-winner against Quincy (Aug. 24). 

The midfielder transferred to Western Illinois from Otero Junior College, where he was named All-Region IX in 2016, in a freshman season that consisted of five goals and five assists. Essacu followed up with 10 goals and eight assists the next season to lead his team to a Region IX Championship, along with being named First Team All-Region IX and First Team All-West District. 



 
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