Nigeria’s Super Falcons lost 1-0 to the Red Flames of Belgium in their final Group C game at the Cyprus Women’s Cup on Monday, Completesports.com reports
Elena Dohnt scored the winning goal for the Belgians in the seventh minute of the highly entertaining encounter.
The Red Blames were fully in control of the game in the first half but failed to add to their one goal advantage before the half-time break.
Super Falcons head coach Thomas Dennerby made a number changes to his squad after the break with the likes Anam Imo who bagged the winner in the 4-3 win against Slovakia last Friday, Chinaza Uchendu and Ngozi coming on but with little effect.
The reigning African champions top star Asisat Oshoala make occasional forays into the opposition half was curtailed by the Europeans who put up a disciplined performance at the back.
Dennerby’s ladies finished the group with three points from three group games.
The West Africans opened the competition with a 4-1 loss to Austria, but recovered to beat Slovakia 4-3 in their second game.
Austria who beat Slovakia 1-0 in the group’s other game also on Monday top the group with seven points from three games, while Belgium finished second also with seven points but with an inferior goal difference.
Nigeria finished in third position with three points, while Slovakia who lost all their group games failed to record a point.
The other African country who partipated in the competition, the Banyana Banyana of South Africa also on Monday lost to 2-1 to Czech Republic.
By Adeboye Amosu
4 Comments
CS peddling wrong information. No body crashes out in this tournament. Depending on which position a team finishes in the Group, they would play a classification match. Falcons would play Thailand on Wednesday for the 7th/8th classification match. A good workout for the Falcons
Tell them. They don’t do their home work before writing. Some commentators on this forum are even more detailed and informative than the CSN writers.
The wait to defeat a team ranked higher than them in the FIFA rankings continues for the Super Falcons under coach Dennerby as they fell narrowly to Belgium today in the Cyprus Cup.
Under the Swede, our ladies were hoping to prevent a hat-trick of losses to teams ranked above them but came short with this 1:0 loss against Belgium in what was – funny enough – their best result to date against such teams having previously lost 8:0 to France and 3:0 to China respectively.
One way to look at this defeat is to see it as marked improvement and the narrowing of a gap.
They lost, but did not lose heavily. If they continue this trajectory, they should be formidable by the time the world cup starts in June.
It was also the first time in 5 games that the Falcons kept a clean sheet in the second half of any match.
As Adisboy alludes to above, Dennerby’s ladies still have the 7th place play-off to look forward to as they continue their world cup preparations.
Thus far their, defence is a source of mild worry having now conceded 12 goals from 5 matches since the African Cup of nations while they have scored 9 at the other side.
But if they can build up on the sort of score-line against Belgium today, then, the only way is up.
I am also worried about the defence. 12 goals from 5 games is discouraging for a world cup bound team. But I think they are getting better.