By Eniola Olatunji reporting for Patmos Media Line
– First Loss in 13 Games in a Row …
THE NIGERIAN Super Eagles ranked 26th in the world on Wednesday in Lisbon, Portugal bowed to one of the best football team in the world, Portugal ranked 5th on the FIFA scale 2-1 in an international friendly match.
Pedro Neto opened the scoring sheet for Portugal from Diogo Dalot connect in the 23rd minute but Fisayo Dele Bashiru gave a thorough pass to Akor Adams in the 37th minute to equalize catching the Portuguese masterly defence with only one foot on the ground before both teams went on break.
On resumption, Portugal tried to show class to the Eagles that failed to upgrade their game in the 2nd half when Francisco Concaicao gave Joao Concelo a telepathic pass to score the winning goal in the 75th minute.
World football star, Christiano Ronaldo who is on the cover picture with Akor Adams of Nigeria was thoroughly checked by the Calvin Bassey led defence though he showed occasional scary moments which missed the goal by whiskers. He couldn’t get a goal or work out a penalty favour. CR7 got handshakes and photographs with Nigerian players.
Statistically, Nigeria’s game nose dived in the 2nd half. The 5 shots at goal gotten in the 1st half is what the team ended up with whereas Portugal that had 7 shots at goal in the 1st half made 13 shots later.
Nigeria’s 2 shots on target were recorded in the 1st half while that of Portugal increased from 3 to 7 at full time.
Nigera made 2 corner kicks in the 1st half with none later which ended 2-3 in favor of Portugal when the game went rough in the 2nd half with end result of 20 to 12 foul calls against Nigeria but 2 yellow cards a piece and no player saw red.
Alex Iwobi who emerged Nigeria’s 4th player to earn 100 caps in that match could not get a goal or his usual brilliant assist.
Aboki Ahmed Musa had 111 caps; Defender Joseph Yobo had 101 caps and perhaps longest serving Goalkeeper, Vincent Enyeama also had 101 caps.
Today’s match was actually the second meeting ever between Nigeria’s male senior team and Portugal. The only meeting was on 17th November 2022 in Lisbon when Portugal with their star studded team whipped Nigeria 4-0.
Bruno Fernandez who still played today got a brace (two goals in a match) with Goncalo Ramos and Joao Mario also scoring.
The match against Portugal was the first defeat Coach Eric Chelle got in the 12 games he handled for Nigeria.
For the record, Nigeria got 2-1 against Tanzania; beat Tunisia 3-2; beat Uganda 3-1; mauled Mozambique 4-0; out cunned Algeria Foxes 2-0; plated goalless with Morocco; goalless with Egyptian Pharaohs; outclassed war torn and world cup bound Iran 2-1; failed to cross River Jordan in 2-2 draw, zipped up Zimbabwe 2-0; lowered the Reggae Jamz of Jamaica 3-0 then played 2-2 draw with Poland in Warsaw.
Portugal had Nigeria to have a feel of African top football on their way to the 2026 World Cup which starts tomorrow to be hosted by USA, Canada and Mexico.
Nigeria was haplessly seen off from the world cup qualifiers by less fancied Democratic Republic of Congo DRC. She will not be among the 48 countries to vie for honours for the second consecutive world cup finals.
#PortNgr #FIFA #PFF #NFF #CAF
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