Former Nigerian winger, Tijani Babangida has called on the Super Eagles not to focus their attention on South Africa and Benin Republic alone in the 2026 World Cup qualifiers.
The three-time African champions will have to navigate tricky clashes with tough rivals, South Africa, Benin Republic, now coached by Gernot Rohr, Lesotho, Zimbabwe and Rwanda in Group C.
The teams were paired during the preliminary draws held organized by Confederation of African Football (CAF) in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire.
Super Eagles, who missed out on the Qatar World Cup will begin the hunt for world cup glory in games that will take place over ten watch-ways during the next two years.
However, in a chat with Completesports.com, Babangida stated that South Africa and Benin won’t be of bigger problems for the Super Eagle.
He warned that the other opponents should be of major priority to the Nigeria if they are to navigate their way to the 2026 World Cup.
“This is a tough draw for the Nigeria but I still believe the Super Eagles will qualify for the 2026 World Cup. Facing difficult opponents like South Africa, Benin Republic, Lesotho, Zimbabwe and Rwanda in Group C even makes it more tougher.
“However, I will advise the Super Eagles not to pay attention on South Africa and Benin alone because the other teams are capable of acting as spoiler if not taking seriously.”
The nine groups will play in a home and away, round-robin, format with each of the group winners qualifying automatically for the FIFA World Cup.
The four best group runners-up will then compete in a play-off stage to determine CAF’s representative at the FIFA play-off tournament.
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COMMENTS
Babangida shut up jare. If you people impose NPFL on the coach then we are finished
Many foreign players that have been doing shakara when asked to play for Nigeria will soon start confessing their readiness to wear green white and green just because they want to be at world cup come 2026 and are aware that Nigeria will easily qualify from our group.
Did anyone put into consideration the following happenings in our group. Lesotho wc home matches will be played in south Africa. Just like South Africa will play two home matches with Lesotho. Also, Rwanda will play two home matches with Zimbabwe in Rwanda. Nonetheless, a good team will make use of the two home games. Unfortunately, Rwanda couldn’t make use of the opportunity presented to them as they played goalless in one of the home matches of Zimbabwe played in Rwanda. South Africa may not misuse such opportunities with Rwanda. CAF AND FIFA should stop such practices. If any team wants to choose a neutral venue for their matches, it should not be the venue of any team in the same group but should chose venue of teams in another group.
South Africa is at advantage because they’re our closest rivals.FIFA shouldn’t have let that happen,a venue outside the teams in a group is a fairer decision in my opinion.
The coach of Lesotho is A SOUTH AFRICAN. Tactically sound but no quality players to execute his football axumen.
He might just be a spoiler for Nigeria