Green Falcons of Saudi Arabia Forces Super Eagles of Nigeria to 2-2 Draw in International Friendly
By Eniola Olatunji
Super Eagles of Nigeria on Friday at the Estadio Municipal de Portimao in Portugal shared honors when she was forced to a 2-2 draw by the Green Falcons of Saudi Arabia in an international friendly match.
Team Captain and captain of the famous Al-Hilal, Salman Al-Faraj opened scoring from set piece in the 60th minute which Goalkeeper Uzoho again parried into his net something that he once did against Algeria at the Cup of Nations.
The equalizer came from an own goal from the boots of Al Nassi player, Abdulelah Al-Amri in the 73rd minute.
Super sub and Leicester player, Kelechi Ihenacho alias Senior man scored the second goal for Nigeria at the 81st minute but another Al- Hilal player Mid-fielder, Mohammed Kanno scored the equalizer from another set piece that got a small deflection into the net in the 90+10th minute.
Statistics showed that Nigeria’s performances dropped in the second half from shots at goal to shots on target, the ball possession that Nigeria had 54% in the first half to 47% and the pass accuracy dropped from 85 – 83%. Nigeria was caught offside 6 times to once of Saudi and the corner kicks were 2-4 in favor of Nigeria.
Nigeria and Saudi Arabia has never met in any competition but played goalless in an International Friendly match played on the 26th of May 2010.
While Nigeria had her biggest win with the 10-0 bashing of Sao Tome culminating on 16-0 after the second leg in the AFCON Qualifier, Saudi Arabia had their biggest ever defeat of 0-13 from United Arab Republic in a match played at Casablanca, Morocco on 3rd September 1961.
Nigeria will on Monday at 1600 hours play Mozambique in another international friendly at the same venue in Portugal. The country ranked 40 in the world still has outstanding matches with Lesotho in the world cup qualifier on 13th November 2023; Zimbabwe on 20th November 2023; take a break and resume with South Africa on 3rd June 2024 and then clash with the Squirrels of Benin Republic on 10th June 2024 all for the world cup qualifiers.
Saudi Arabia on 17th October 2023 at 1600 hours will lock horns with Mali in an international friendly match. In the world cup qualifiers, the Green Falcons, so named because of their peculiar green shirts like the Super Eagles, will on 15th November 2023 meet the winner of the Cambodia/Pakistan clash; and on 20th November 2023 play against Jordan.
The Green Falcons had made 6 appearances at the world cup finals with their best result being a round of 16 stages in 1994. The team was Asian Champions thrice in 1984; 1988 and 1996.
The Super Eagles of Nigeria interestingly also had 6 appearances at the world cup finals with their best results being four times at the round of 16 stages in same 1994; 1998 and 2014. Nigeria was African Champions thrice in 1980; 1994 and 2013.
Nigeria has the hurdles to the road of the next world cup in Group C with Benin Republic; Lesotho; Rwanda and South Africa. Soccer pundits believe that except the unforeseen happens, no team can stop Nigeria from their 7th appearance at the world cup.