Three Reasons Why The Super Eagles Can Win AFCON 2019 In Egypt

The Super Eagles further enhanced their reputation in African football with wins against Cameroon (3-2) and South Africa (2-1) in the Round of 16 and quarter-final stage respectively.

This has raised their title chances high up the bar as they aim to win the AFCON coupled with increased expectation from the Nigerian fans.

However, with Nigeria and three other sides remaining in the competition, we evaluate some of the reasons (key factors) why Nigeria stands a higher chance of winning the AFCON 2019 in Egypt.

Knockout First Qualifiers

Out of the 24 teams that made it to the AFCON 2019 in Egypt, Nigeria was the first team to book their place in the knockout stages (Round of 16).

This was followed by Uganda and Egypt that have all been eliminated from the competition by Senegal and South Africa in the knockout round respectively.

Nigeria achieved the feat with 2 wins against Burundi (1-0) and Guinea (1-0) in their first two matches.

This gives them the match ascendancy going forward in the tournament as we would have seen as Nigeria is on course to win the AFCON with a place in the last four.

No Penalty Shoot-Out

Nigeria have progressed thus far in the competition without a shot at penalties as at now.

This is proof of the quality in Gernot Rohr’s Super Eagles side.

Other teams like Senegal may not have been involved in the penalty shoot-out to navigate their way to this stage but it’s obvious that the Teranga Lions have faced relatively easier teams (at least on paper) like Benin Republic and Uganda.

This is unlike Nigeria that had tougher game to deal with as Algeria and Tunisia needed Penalty picks to pull through to this stage as we saw the former slotting it out against the Ivorian side.

Beating Defending Champions

There are some insinuations among football fans that when a team beats Spanish giants Barcelona they will go on to win the UEFA Champions League.

That may be working at least to an extent as Liverpool did (the same) beat the La Liga giants (4-0 in the return leg of the semi-finals at Anfield and 4-3 on aggregate) to win the much coveted European crown.

As for Nigeria this may look similar as they beat defending Champions Cameroon 3-2 in the Round of 16.

Since after beating Cameroon, Nigeria have improved in confidence with an obvious positive euphoria as they look like going all the way to replace Cameroon at the African podium.

Obiweluozo Martins