When the gods deserted the Eagles

If there is a god of soccer, on Tuesday, March 25, 2025, it deserted the Super Eagles of Nigeria.

On the dot of 90 minutes, with only added time of some five minutes left to play, Eric Chelle had his plan for winning the match. He replaced a forward with another forward.

He replaced Victor Osimhen, the most consistent finisher in the team, with Boniface who had not scored a single goal for the national team to date. Or has he? If any player was likely to score, it would be Osimhen.

I did not understand the substitution. If Eric wanted the team to ‘shut down’ and run down the match as they did successfully against Rwanda, basic tactics would require that he added a player to the midfield/defense area, get the players to keep possession of the ball as much as possible, and to close up the spaces in the midfield, disallowing the opposing team from doing anything constructive.

That is what he did during the Rwandan match after the Eagles were two goals up and time was running out.

Against Zimbabwe, however, the situation was different. With only one goal in the kitty, it was dangerous to do what he did against Rwanda. So, his substitution meant, in basic football tactics, that he wanted to score another goal.

But it was clear the Zimbabweans were desperate, had started to throw everything forward, and were unlucky to have been denied what could have been a goal had VAR been available to check where the ball landed when it struck the crossbar and landed either behind or in front of the Nigerian goal line. No one is still certain where the ball landed.

Still the Super Eagles’ intentions were not obvious – to attack or defend the lone goal? They did neither. The Eagles suddenly looked tired. They started to leave yawning gaps in the