Nigeria regathered their pleasure on Thursday night time with a 1-0 victory over hosts Cote d’Ivoire to take them joint high of Group A with 4 factors after two video games on the 2023 Africa Cup of Nations.
Equatorial Guinea occupy pole place after Emilio Nsue scored the primary hat trick on the event since 2008 to assist his facet sweep previous Guinea Bissau 4-2 within the early afternoon recreation on the Alassane Outtara stadium in Abidjan
Hyped as a crunch conflict between west African powerhouses, Nigeria and Cote d’Ivoire started at a livid tempo.
Victor Osimhen was let out on the left for the primary probability of the match however the Napoli striker botched his lob over goalkeeper Yahia Fofana.
Stung by the impertinence, the hosts went down the opposite finish. Stanley Nwabali stopped the counter with a pointy save from Christian Kouamé’s strike.
Kouamé squandered one other alternative three minutes later. However the early flurry gave approach to a fug of warning and sloppiness as each groups failed to seek out fluid connections between midfield and assault.
For all of the attacking expertise on show, a defender broke the impasse.
Eight minutes into the second-half, referee Mustapha Ghorbal pointed to the penalty spot after the video assistants highlighted a foul on Osimhen.
Skipper William Ekong stepped up and walloped the ball down the center of Fofana’s objective.
Response
The partisans riled, the gamers responded with extra urgency. However Ekong was as doughty in defence as he was deft in assault.
Cote d’Ivoire coach Jean-Louis Gasset despatched on Jonathan Bamba for Kouamé in a direct swap of strikers. One other attacker, Nicolas Pepé, entered rather than midfielder Jeremie Boga.
However the ploys introduced no pleasure. Nigeria sat deep and rode their luck to carry on for slender win.
“It wasn’t a straightforward recreation,” mentioned Osimhen. “We knew the Ivorians had been going to be robust in opposition to us.
“They have a variety of high quality gamers from the goalkeeper to the assault however we executed our recreation plan and it is a large win for us.”
Nigeria will face Guinea Bissau of their last recreation within the pool on Monday night time on the Félix Houphouët-Boigny Stadium in Abidjan. A draw will probably be sufficient to take them into the last-16 knockout levels.
The hosts are in a extra precarious place following the setback and might want to beat Equatorial Guinea on Monday to be assured of a spot within the second section. A draw – giving Cote d’Ivoire 4 factors – would most likely be sufficient to advance them to the last-16 as one of many 4 finest third-placed groups.
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