* Tunisia scrap into the knockout phase with 1-1 draw with Tanzania
Duro Ikhazuagbe
Nigeria’s Super Eagles finished the group stage campaign of the ongoing 2025 Africa Cup of Nations with maximum nine points to top Group C.
Opening goal from Paul Onuachu in the 28th minute plus a brace from Raphael Onyedika in the 62nd and 67th minutes ensured that Nigeria repaid a 47-year-old debt to the Ugandans that defeated Green Eagles at the 1978 edition hosted by Ghana in Accra.
What even made the victory sweet for Nigeria was that it was achieved with a largely second IX and coach Eric Chelle rested the bulk of his starting line up.
Only Victor Osimhen and Calvin Bassey can be said to be amongst the first IX players in the squad to reduce the match to a training session for the East Africans who were looking for their first win to wrestle the second placed ticket from Tunisia who drew 1-1 with Tanzania in the second game of the Group C.
Nigeria dominated the first half and to Eagles’ credit, they showed ambitions to win this encounter even though they had already qualified for the knockout rounds of the tournament.
Moses Simon was lively on the left side of attack, while there were interesting duel between two big men – Calvin Bassey in the Nigerian defence and Uche Ikpeazu, whose father is Nigerian, in the attack of the Cranes of Uganda.
At the return from the first half break, Uganda’s experienced goalkeeper, Denis Onyango, who was injured in the first half, had to be substituted by second choice goalkeeper, Salim Magoola.
Magoola stayed barely 10 minutes on the pitch before getting a red card for stopping Victor Osimhen’s goal-bound ball with his hands outside his area.
Coach Paul Put then had to pull out a player to field Uganda’s third choice goalkeeper.
Three minutes later, Raphael Onyedika coolly collected Samuel Chukwueze’s lob to increase Nigeria’s tally to 2-0.
And in the 67th minuted, Onyedika scored his second and Eagles went up 3-0.
Rogers Mayo however pulled one back for Uganda in the 75th minute to give the Cranes a false sense of hope of a possible equaliser coming.
A flurry of changes of bringing in majorly defenders effectively sealed off Eagles backline, while the match dragged on with no more goals coming from either side.
RESULTS
Uganda 1-3 Nigeria
Tanzania 1-1 Tunisia
