Central Africa Shock Eagles In Lagos To Record 1st Win In 3 Years

Nigeria’s Super Eagles suffered a shocking 1-0 defeat to the Central African Republic in their third group C match of the Qatar 2022 FIFA World Cup qualifying race at the Teslim Balogun Stadium Lagos on Thursday.

Kari Namnganda took advantage of a miscalculation between William Troost-Ekong and Leon Balogun to fire a shot past helpless Goalkeeper Francis Uzoho and gave the Central African country their first victory in three years.

The Gernot Rohr-led star studded Eagles struggled to break their visitors’ defensive organisation all through the encounter with a lot of extremely poor final balls and they were made to pay for it in the 90th minute as CAR converted their only shot on target in the match.

Following the lack of cutting edge in the first half, Gernot Rohr made a tactical change with Union Berlin striker Taiwo Awoniyi replacing Iheanacho immediately after the break.

It was Awoniyi’s debut outing for the Super Eagles and he came closest to breaking the deadlock in the 53rd minute after Osimhen’s shot struck the post but his effort was off target.

Later in the encounter, Ahmed Musa and Bordeaux winger Samuel Kalu replaced Joe Aribo and Moses Simon respectively but their impacts were not enough to rescue the three time African champions.

Despite the defeat to CAR in Lagos, Super Eagles remained at the top of group C with six points after three games while Central African Republic moved up to the third spot with four points from the same number of games. Cape Verde also has four points following their 2-1 defeat of Liberia on Thursday. The Lone Star of Liberia occupied the bottom table with three points.

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