SAN FRANCISCO, December 06, (THEWILL) –Â Nigeria’s Under-20 national team, the Flying Eagles, in their first fixture towards qualification for the 2021 Africa U20 Cup of Nations, played out a 1-1 draw against Ivory Coast at the Stade Charles de Gaulle, Porto-Novo on Sunday afternoon.
Coach Ladan Bosso replaced injured goalkeeper John Amah with Kolawale Oladipo in goal while Mike Zaruma, Moses Solomon, Isaiah Ejeh and Christopher Nwaeze gave Oladipo cover at the back.
Adewale Oladoye, Azeez Oseni and Muhammad Abdallah manned the Nigerian midfield while Chisom Orji, Wisdom Ubani and Peter Olawale took up the attacking positions.
Bosso’s charges had a first half that revealed a lack of clinical finishing in the final-third. Olawale and Nwaeze both missed gilt-edged chances to put Nigeria ahead.
However, Nwaeze made up for missed chances at just past the hour mark, when he broke the deadlock as he headed home from an Ubani free-kick. But, the goal-scorer was to go from good news to bad.
In the 69th minute, shortly after Ubani missed a clear chance to double the advantage, the Flying Eagles were reduced to 10 men after Nwaeze was dismissed for a second bookable offense.
As expected, the red card unsettled the gameplan of the Flying Eagles and they could not hold on to their slender lead as the Ivorians equalised in the first minute of stoppage time.
The Flying Eagles will now be under pressure to win their final Group B match of the WAFU-UFOA Zone B qualifiers on Wednesday, December 9 against perennial rivals Ghana.
