AFCON 2023: Will Super Eagles Fly?

 

Like the other world football tournaments, the Africa Cup of Nations is one of the best competitions at disclosing every member Nation’s biggest flaw, and at the same time rewarding excellence. Having said this, one of the countries which have had her challenges laid bare in recent time is Nigeria. Widely regarded as one of African’s football powers, having maintained her place amongst the AFCON top three in 20 of the 26 tournaments from 1976 to 2013, winning the trophy three times in that span.

However, since Super Eagle’s 2013 triumph in South Africa, they have made the AFCON news just once, a third-place honour in 2019. Outside of that, they failed to secure a qualification in 2015 and 2017 and were knocked out in the Round of 16 last time out in 2021. Globally, Nigeria failed to qualify for the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar, and they have also begun 2026 qualifiers poorly, having kicked it off with a pair of disappointing 1-1 draw against Lesotho and Zimbabwe, and recorded another defeat days before the commencement of the AFCON tournament 2-0 by Guinea in a pre-tournament friendly. The Super Eagles of Nigeria were also held down in a 1-1 draw in their AFCON opening game against Equatorial Guinea, coming from behind with a header from Victor Osimhen.

It’s no gainsaying that Super Eagles have a roster full of top-class footballers, yet, they have failed to translate talents into results. On top of the talent chart is Victor Osimhen, who has emerged as a World-class striker for Naples, and being the current best Player in Africa, he will be ready to lead the Nigeria front line at AFCON. With the right supporting casts, there’s no doubt that Osimhen and the Eagles will be an attacking force to reckon with. Unfortunately, the supporting casts took a massive hit as Victor Boniface and Umar Sadiq, who were having a breakout season with their respective teams, went down with injuries in pre-tournament training and will miss the competition.

With Boniface and Sadiq out, that leaves Nigeria with Fulham playmaker Alex Iwobi as the team’s most in-form chance creator. Ac Milan Winger, Samuel Chukwueze and Leicester City Forward, Kelechi Iheanacho will be major players as well, but both have struggled for form this year. Nigeria must find ways to score more goals if they are to avoid another disappointment, and the Portuguese Boss, Jose Peseiro knows that his status as the Eagles’ Manager strongly hangs on this competition.

Careful management of the squad, they could reach the semi-finals, even with the presence of more cohesive sides like Morocco, Senegal, and Egypt that are likely to have a better shot at lifting the trophy. If Super Eagles can find their form and move on from the embarrassing start of the tournament against Equatorial Guinea, they are capable of scoring goals in bunches. The quantity needed to win AFCON is relatively low such that few big games could do the trick. Even with the absence of Boniface, there’s enough creative quality in Super Eagles to give Osimhen the volume of chances required to make Eagles fly very high.