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| Leone Stars Threaten Eagles' Perfect Qualifying Record |
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| Written by Adeleke Afolayan | ||||||||||||||||||
| Wednesday, 08 October 2008 | ||||||||||||||||||
     In camp for the Super Eagles ahead of the encounter on Saturday afternoon are goalkeepers Austin Ejide and Dele Aiyenugba, Lokomotiv Moscow's Peter Odemwingie as well as Dream Team IV players Onyekachi Apam, Sani Kaita, Victor Obinna Nsofor, Dele Adeleye and Femi Ajilore. While Nigeria has won all her five matches in the series, scoring seven goals and conceding no goal in the process, Sierra Leone has seven points in second place and must win in Abuja to stand any chance of making the final phase of qualifying as one of the best second placed countries. Another country needing a win to finish as one of the best second placed countries is Ghana who welcome Lesotho to Takoradi in Group Five with the Black Stars in third place on nine points behind Gabon on goal difference and leaders Libya on 12 points. Libya must avoid defeat away at Gabon on Sunday in one of the star matches of the weekend to seal her place in the final qualifying phase while Gabon must defeat the North African Nation by at least a goal to all but ensure qualification. Gabon would grab the automatic qualifying spot with victory of a goal of more over Libya and Ghana not having a better result at home to Lesotho. Ghana meanwhile must defeat Lesotho and hope Gabon does not better its result against Libya to get the automatic spot. All Libya needs is to avoid defeat at Gabon. In other qualifiers this weekend, 2010 Nations Cup hosts Angola on seven points must defeat Niger in Luanda and hope other results across Africa; including the other Group Three encounter between Uganda on seven points and group leaders Benin in Kampala, ends in its favour. Group Two sees leaders Kenya needing just a draw in Conakry to ensure qualification while Guinea must defeat the Kenyans to get top spot and a ticket to the final qualifying phase. A draw in Conakry or a Kenyan win would open the door for Zimbabwe to sneak into second spot with a win away at Namibia; the Zimbabweans have six points while Guinea has eight points and Kenya leads with 10 points. The closest group however is Group Six which has Algeria leading with nine points and is followed by West African neighbours Gambia and Senegal with eight points apiece. While Algeria play bottom country Liberia in Monrovia on Sunday, Gambia must go across the border to Senegal for a feisty derby in Dakar on Saturday night with a win the sole purpose of both countries. Other matches see Cote D'Ivoire host second places Madagascar with the visitors needing a massive win to get an automatic qualifying spot from Group Seven while in Group Eight, Rwanda would get top spot ahead of Morocco with a win over Ethiopia. Morocco, three points behind Rwanda, face Mauritania in Rabat. Group Nine has Burkina Faso leading with 13 points and needing only a draw away to bottom-of-the-group Burundi on Sunday to seal qualification ahead of Tunisia that has 10 points and host Seychelles on Saturday night in Rades. In Group 10, Stephen Keshi's Mali will watch the match in Omdurman between Sudan and Congo as a win for Congo would leave the Malians needing a calculator while a Sudanese win less than six goals would send the Eagles into the final qualifying phase. Finally in Group 12, African champions Egypt have all but sealed their place in the final qualifying phase and host whipping team Djibouti; that has conceded 26 goals and scored just two, in Cairo. The other group encounter would see Malawi host DR Congo in Blantyre with both countries on nine points bu DR Congo in second place on goal difference having scored one more goal than Malawi (13 to 12) and conceded same number of goals; four.  Quote this article on your site | Print | E-mail
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