'Why should South Africa play tomorrow?'  - Peseiro slams Fifa over 2026 World Cup qualifiers scheduling

Manager Jose Peseiro has criticized football's governing body, Fifa over the 2026 World Cup qualifiers scheduling, which would see the Super Eagles complete their November internationals a day after South Africa's opening game in Group C against Benin.

On paper, Bafana Bafana are Nigeria's biggest rivals of the 2026 World Cup qualifiers and Peseiro is of the opinion that the South Africans have been handed an advantage by Fifa's imbalanced fixtures list. 

The Super Eagles had just one proper training session before taking to the Godswill Akpabio International Stadium turf to face Lesotho, bearing in mind that Tuesday's session was more or less a recovery workout as seventeen of the players named in the matchday squad arrived in Uyo on that day.

Peseiro acknowledged that these problems with logistics negatively impacted the performance of the Super Eagles players during their embarrassing 1-1 draw against Lesotho on Thursday.

Speaking at the post-match press conference, the Portuguese football tactician said: "We didn't prepare well, even the players didn't rest well because some players came on Monday, others on Tuesday.

"We could not train with intensity in that moment.Yesterday we trained but not with intensity because we must play today. For that I ask why the match was scheduled for Thursday.

"Next three days my team is going to play Zimbabwe. Why should South Africa play tomorrow, we played today. Why? I don't know.

"Our team is the best in the group, we drew but I think we will win the next match but our players must make sacrifices.

"They fought today. The ball didn't go in, bad luck for us. We are going to give a response against Zimbabwe even if we don't rest well."

West Brom central defender Semi Ajayi prevented Nigeria from suffering a devastating home defeat when he rose highest to head in the equalizer midway through the second half.

Ifeanyi Emmanuel 

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