By Charles Ohizua
The Wolverhampton Wanderers of England goalkeeper, Carl Ikeme, has received plaudits from the Super Eagles chief coach, Sunday Oliseh, who attributed the debutant’s heroics as the saving grace that prevented Nigeria from an imminent defeat in the hands of hard fighting Tafia of Tanzania.
Tanzania held Nigeria to a 0-0 draw in Saturday’s 2017 Africa Cup of Nations qualifier played at the Benjamin Mkapa National Stadium, Dar-es-Salaam.
Carl Ikeme on several occasions denied the Taifa Stars a chance to take maximum points. The towering Wolverhampton Wanderers keeper best moment was an amazing save in the 67th minute when he denied Thomas Ulimwengu with a long stretch before scrambling to Mrisho Ngassa’s follow-up which went by the post, with both shots coming from inside the six-yard box.
Eagles captain, Ahmed Musa, showed a fine turn of pace to burst down the left and cut back for Emmanuel Emenike, only for the striker to be fouled to hand Sunday Oliseh’s men a free kick in the second minute of the match.
The resultant kick was not enough to threaten goalkeeper Ali Mustapha who was rarely troubled by the Eagles’ frontline. Not too long afterwards, the hosts got their first chance through Mlinwengu – and that seemed to knock off Nigeria out of their rhythm as they failed to create an opening of note for the remainder of the first half.
Mrisho Ngasa had a chance to open the scoring in the 13th minute, but his shot from the edge of the area was blocked as the Taifa Stars continued their dominance.
Ikeme was then called into action to keep out Farid Musa’s close-range header after the striker had got on the end of captain Nadir Haroub’s dangerous free-kick.
Nigeria went close to getting the curtain raiser, but Mustapha did well to pluck Musa’s flick-on off the line before Mosee Simon was denied by a block in the area.
Oliseh introduced Sylvester Igboun for Haruna Lukman who seemed to be lost in the midfield but that did not yield any result as the hosts dictated the pace from the middle.
Tanzania edged the initial stages, although Emenike felt that he should have earned a penalty two minutes into half time when he went down under pressure from Shomari Kapombe. Contact was minimal and the referee waved away protests before the Taifa Stars continued to threaten.
Towards the end of the game, Nigeria did not fare any better as they failed to punish the hosts’ who were lethargic in the latter part of the game as goalkeeper Ikeme held sway in goal to prevent the hosts from snatching a win.
With this result, the Super Eagles now have four points and top Group G. pending the outcome of Sunday’s game between Chad and Egypt. While Tanzania who last made an AFCON appearance 35 years ago remain at the base of the log with a point.
OTHER RESULTS
Djibouti 0-2 Togo;
Namibia 0-2 Senegal;
Comoros 0-1 Uganda;
Burundi 2-0 Niger;
Rwanda 0-1 Ghana;
Sao Tome 0-3 Morocco;
Guinea-Bissau 2-4 Congo;
Liberia 1-0 Tunisia;
Botswana 1-0 Burkina Faso;
Tanzania 0-0 Nigeria;
South Sudan 1-0 Eq Guinea;
Seychelles 1-1 Ethiopia;
Mauritania 3 – 1 South Africa;
SUNDAY’S FIXTURES
Sierra Leone v Ivory Coast;
Madagascar v Angola;
CAR v DR Congo;
Mauritius v Mozambique;
Swaziland v Malawi;
Lesotho v Algeria;
Zimbabwe v Guinea;
Chad v Egypt;
Kenya v Zambia;
Benin v Mali;
The Gambia v Cameroon;
Libya v Cape Verde.
