Asisat Oshoala defied an ankle injury to play for Nigeria in Monday’s 1-0 defeat to host France at the Roazhon Park, Rennes, Completesports.com reports.
Oshoala, Completesports.com scooped, picked up the injury in the Super Falcons’ second Group B match against Korea Republic which they won 2-0. However, she defied the injury to be available for the next match as the team needed their best legs to face Les Bleus of France.
The Barcelona Ladies’ star forward scored Nigeria’s second goal in the encounter and also picked up the player of the match award.
She limped out of the game against France on Monday due to hamstrung injury and was replaced by Anam Imo seven minutes from time.
Oshoala remains doubtful for Super Falcons’ next game should they progress into the knockout stages.
The African champions could face either Germany or Italy if they made it to the second round as one of the best four third-placed teams in the the competition’s group phase.
Nigeria’s progress will be sealed if Argentina are unable to accomplish a handsome win over Scotland in their final Group D game on Thursday, or Cameroon are unable to defeat New Zealand by more than one goal in their final Group E match on Friday.
China, with four points in Group B, and Australia with three points already from two matches in Group C, look already good enough for the Round of 16.
With the USA and Sweden packing all the points in Group F, third –placed Chile is still pointless and must defeat Thailand by more than three goals to get in the way of Nigeria.
By Adeboye Amosu
4 Comments
The permutation and combination has started. Nigeria still has a slim chance to go through to the round of 16.
I forsee that the Group 3rd place teams in A,B,C,D will qualifier for the next while E and F will not make it. That means Nigeria,China,Brazil and Agentina/scotland will go through.
key matches to watch
GroupD
Argentina vs Scotland if it ends in draw it favours Nigeria, Any winner in this match will defintely qualifier ahead of us.
GroupE
Cameroon vs NewZealand : Any winner in this match with a 2 goal lead will qualifier ahead of us
GroupF
Chile (GD-5)vs Thailand(GD-17) : If Chile can win Thailand with more than 3 goals then they qualifier ahead of us
But I personally don’t see this 3 possibilities hapening. One may happen but I doubt the 3 and I still believe we can go through.
Welldone Super Falcons, you have already proven that you are African champions and no pushovers on the world stage
If possible in 16 then see us in semi. I love you
I want us to play Italy rather than Germany in the second round !!…again the coach could have allowed other strikers in the team to replace Ashiola rather than allow her to play in yesterday’s match since she had an harms string before the match ?..she never had any impact in yesterday match, that was a real minus to the team !!
She had an ankle injury before the match not a hamstring. She licked up the hamstring during the match