South Africa Coach Baxter Reveals Plans To Stop Penalty Box Predator Ighalo

South Africa coach Stuart Baxter has claimed that Bafana Bafana defenders will not man-mark Odion Ighalo when they face Nigeria in Wednesday evening's Africa Cup of Nations quarterfinal clash in Cairo.

The former Watford striker has been Nigeria's most influential player at the ongoing tournament, having a hand in four (3 goals, 1 assists) of the five goals scored by the three-time African champions.

And Baxter has revealed that one of the ways to nullify Ighalo's threat is simply to cut off supply to the Super Eagles number 9.

''We don’t make individual plans for players in terms of man marking. We would solve that as a team,'' Baxter said.

''We would make it difficult for them (Nigeria) to play quality balls to their strikers and would defend like we normally defend.

''That is part of the ways you can make individual strategies to certain players. Being a central striker, Ighalo will fall into the back four as a unit, and we’ll screen the midfield which will make it difficult for him.''

Ighalo specializes in scoring from inside the penalty area and all his international goals have come from inside the box with the exception of his opener in a 4-0 win vs Cameroon in September 2017.

Ifeanyi Emmanuel