Nigeria Vs Equatorial Guinea | Squad News And Insights To Outcomes.

January 13, 2024January 14, 2024 saintemeralds247

As Nigeria’s Super Eagles faces Equatorial Guinea in the second overall AFCON match 2024 in Ivory Coast tomorrow (14th, Janurary 2024), they hope to kick a start to end the long-wait win of the AFCON again and this journey begins with the group stage clash against Equatorial Guinea.

The Super Eagles of Nigeria being one of Africa’s giant have consistently underperformed in the AFCON in recent years. Nigeria’s Super Eagles won their last AFCON in 2013 against Burkina Faso on a 1-0 win with Sunday Mba scoring the only goal in the final match which crowned Nigeria as the AFCON winner back in 2013.

 

Nigeria’s new head coach Manager Jose Peseiro has been said to head into the competition with some underlying pressures , having drawn with a supposed underdogs Lesotho and Zimbabwe in the World Cup qualifying before losing to Guinea in a friendly match.

As Nigeria makes their 20^th appearance at the CAF Africa Cup of Nations , having won on three occasions in 1980,1994 and 2013 and reaching the semi-finals in 14 of their last 17 AFCON participations, they prepare to go into this 2024 AFCON with great hope and high morale especially with their star man and forward Victor Osimhen who has been directly involved in 55% of Nigeria’s goals during the qualifying competitions owing 10 goals and 2 assists must have boosted the team’s confidence.

The Napoli star Victor Osimhen who has 119 overall appearance for Napoli and has scored 67 goals and 17 assists ( 2022-23,2023-24) for the club since he joined will definitely be a major issue to deal with for the Equatorial Guinea defense line.

However, the Nigeria Super Eagles are still in possession of some quality and skillful attackers like Ahmed Musa who has always been involved in every major tournament and Samuel Chukwueze who plays for AC Milan in the Seria A.

With no doubt, Victor Boniface of Bayer Leverkusen ; another talented attacker who might have been included in the AFCON tournament on the Super Eagles side will be missed due to his late injury few weeks before the beginning of the AFCON as well as Wilfred Ndidi who could have been part of the team has been ruled out of this month’s African Cup of Nations due to his injury as well as Awoniyi of who was also left out due to a groin injury.

 

On the other side , Nzalang Nacional of Equatorial Guinea will give a hard battle and fight till the last minute against Nigeria Super Eagles. The Equatorial Guinea team will definitely look forward to continue their impressive record of progressing to the last eight whenever they participate at the AFCON.

Juan Micha (Equatorial Guinea’s coach) was known to be formidable in 2023 World Cup qualifying games , claiming victories against Namibia and Liberia without conceding a goal.

The Nzalang Nacional’s top victory of the previous year was the 1-0 win over Tunisia in the AFCON qualifier and this definitely will build a strong wall of confidence in securing another shocking victory against their opponent Nigeria who we think is yet to get their foot solidly planted in general competitions like this as their recent performances wasn’t too confusing.

Nigeria Super Eagles and Equatorial Guinea have never met before in the CAF Africa Cup of Nations. However, they did face each other during the qualifiers for the 2010 FIFA World Cup, with Nigeria emerging victorious in both matches, winning 1-0 and 2-0.

Team news and squads for AFCON 2024.

Nigeria possible XI : Uzoho, Osayi-Samuel, Troost-Ekong, Ajayi, Bassey, Chukwueze, Aribo, Iwobi, Simon, Musa, Osimhen.

Lot’s have changed in the Super Eagles squad after some key men have been laid back due to injury and Peseiro was left with no choice but had to deal with several forced withdrawals like Wilfred Ndidi who we expect to have played side by side with Alex Iwobi who’s on his top form at Fulham, Victor Boniface and Sadiq Umar. We also don’t expect to see much of Kelechi Iheanacho in the squad list as his inclusion in the starting XI is doubtful.

Equatorial Guinea possible XI: Owono; Akapo, Anieboh, Orozco, Ndong; Ganet, Bikoro; Miranda, Machin, Salvador; Nsue.

With Emilio Nsue as the key man for Equatorial Guinea , we don’t know if the Super Eagles defense will be able to hold the striker.

 

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