The 2018 silver medallists were held to a scoreless draw in the two teams’ first game played at the Mau Stadium – located in the centre of Zanzibar – on Monday.

Nigeria, also bronze medal winners in 2014, dominated Monday’s game all-round, with superior ball possession and attempts on goal. They created a plethora of chances but the Zanzibar rearguard worked overtime to keep the scoreline barren.

Adedayo Olamilekan, Hadi Haruna, Sikiru Alimi and Harrison Tochukwu were impressive in a game in which goalkeeper Ozoemena Ani, captain Nduka Junior, Leonard Ngenge, Abdulrafiu Taiwo, Sodiq Ismaila, Ijoma Anthony, Harrison Ozondu, Akanni Qudus, Taofeek Otaniyi, Godwin Obaje, Jabbar Malik and Shola Adelani also featured.

Thursday’s encounter, also scheduled for the Mau Stadium, comes five days before Nigeria’s first match of the competition – a clash with Cup holders Senegal – at Zanzibar’s 15,000 -capacity Amaan Stadium.

The Eagles will then confront Sudan in their second match of the group phase (also at the Amaan Stadium) on Tuesday, 12^th August before concluding their group D campaign against Congo at the Benjamin Mkapa Stadium in Dar es Salaam on Tuesday, 19^th August.

The four-week, 19-nation finals have encamped five teams in groups A, B and C, with only Nigeria’s group D having only four teams. Other venues for the competition are the Moi International Sports Centre, Kasarani and the Nyayo National Stadium (both in Nairobi, Kenya), and the Mandela National Stadium in Kampala, Uganda.

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By Amaechi Agbo

Nigeria, for the very first time, squashed Ghana in an African Nations Championship qualifying fixture, and with so much style, to earn the ticket to the eighth instalment of the competition scheduled for Tanzania, Kenya and Uganda in February 2025 after a 3-1 whiplash of the visitors at the Godswill Akpabio Stadium in Uyo on Saturday.

Three well-taken goals in six minutes wrote a new chapter in the history of contests between both nations at this level, and it was seriously not at a turn that Ghana would have wanted it.

Coach Mas-Ud Didi Dramani expressed confidence ahead of the game, saying his boys would play an attacking game, but it was Nigeria that was on the front foot throughout the first period and could have finished the half with more than their three brilliant goals.

First, telepathy was at play as Captain Junior Nduka flung the ball from the defence to Remo Stars’ team-mate Ismaila Sodiq, who sprang Ghana’s offside trap and buried the ball past goalkeeper Benjamin Asare in the 18th minute. Two minutes later, it would have been two for the Super Eagles B but Adamu Abubakar’s close-range shot found the back of defender Abban Ebenezer and went shy of the goal.

From the resultant corner kick, Captain Nduka made hay, sweeping the ball past Asare as the visiting rearguard ball-watched against a Nigerian side playing with so much gusto.

Three minutes later, from a defensive mix-up between goalkeeper Asare and defender Nurudeen Abdulai, Saviour Isaac snatched the ball at pace and slotted past Asare to make it 3-0.

Dominated and flustered, the Black Galaxies were pleading for mercy, but it would still have been four if veteran forward Sikiru Alimi had not been tardy with a good chance as Isaac sent him through on the counter in the 44th minute.

In the second half, with the Director General of the National Sports Commission, Chief Bukola Olopade and President of NFF, Alhaji Ibrahim Musa Gusau among the watching dignitaries, the Super Eagles refused to take their feet off the pedal, as Isaac, and later Alimi with a brilliant header off Sodiq’s free-kick, could have added to the visitors’ misery.

Ghana hit one back with 18 minutes left to play, when the precocious Stephen Amankona fired to the blind side of goalkeeper Henry Ozoemena after an exchange of passes with Albert Amoah.

Still, it was too little too late. Ghana’s miserable year was complete, with the Black Stars’ horrendous group-stage exit at the Africa Cup of Nations in Cote d’Ivoire, failure of the Black Stars to qualify for next year’s AFCON, and the failure of the Black Starlets to qualify for the Africa U17 Cup of Nations.

Deservedly, Nigeria celebrated wildly at a return to the CHAN, at which they won the silver medals in Morocco six years ago, and at the expense of bogey team Ghana for that matter.

President of NFF, Alhaji Gusau said: “We are very happy to end the year on a high. Returning to the African Nations Championship has been part of our agenda and we are happy to have achieved that. Now, the real work begins, which is to ensure that the team is adequately prepared to go for the trophy in East Africa early next year.”

Galaxies’ Coach Mas-Ud Didi Dramani attributed his team’s failure to the fact that Daniel Ogunmodede’s charges were hungrier for glory. “They were full of running and played their hearts out. Congratulations to Nigeria because they deserved their victory. They were the better team.”

Ogunmodede said it was not yet time for celebrations. “We are happy to have given Nigerians a good gift for this yuletide period, but we will not over-celebrate this achievement and forget the crux of the matter. We will work hard so that we can contend very well for the trophy at the finals in February.”

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