Super Eagles take one steps towards Qatar 2022 after playing goalless draw with Ghana in Kumasi

NIGERIA'S Super Eagles have taken a significant step towards qualifying for Qatar 2022 after being held to a barren draw by Ghana's Black Stars at the Baba Yari Stadium in Kumasi in the first leg of the World Cup qualification play-off.

Dubbed the jollof derby, the two-legged play-off between Nigeria and Ghana will now be concluded at the Moshood Abiola Stadium in Abuja when the teams meet for the second leg. It was one of five African play-off to determine who rep-resents the continent at the World Cup later on this year.

In a rather drab match, lacking in numerous goal scoring opportunities, the Black Stars only really had two scoring opportunities, throughout the match. In the first half at the beginning of the second half, Nigerian goalkeeper Francis Uzoho prevented the Eagles from going behind with two pint blank saves.

At the other end, Nigeria's only real chance was in the 50th minute when Simon Moses was through on goal after some intricate passing but the Ghanaian goalkeeper prevented a goal using his legs. In the 76th minute, the referee awarded Nigeria a penalty for handball but then changed his mind after watching the incident ion VAR.

With neither side really dominating the other, the game flowed from end to end and could have gone to either side. In all the other African qualifiers that were played today,  goals were scored as DR Congo and Morocco drew 1-1 in Kinshasa, Algeria beat Cameroon 1-0 in Yaoundé, Tunisia beat Mali 1-0 in Bamako and Egypt secured a 1-0 win over Senegal in Cairo.

Arguably, Nigeria's greatest achievement today was giving debuts to fullback Calvin Bassey and winger Ademola Lookman. Both of them came on in the second half in a bizarre series of substitutions that saw head coach Augustine Eguavoen made like-for-like changes, handing shirts to debutants at a time when a change of formation was needed.

Nigeria XI

Uzoho

Aina

Sanusi (Bassey)

Ekong

Balogun

Bonke (Etebo)

Aribo ( (Onyeka)

Chukwueze (Dennis)

Iheanacho

Osimhen

Simon (Lookman)