Soccer World Cup 2011 / Nigeria

This article covers the Nigerian national soccer team of women (nickname "Super Falcons") at the soccer world championship of women 2011 in Germany.

Before the World Cup, Nigeria were 27th in the FIFA world rankings and were the only African team to have taken part in all previous Women's World Cup finals . At the 1999 World Cup , they reached the quarter-finals, in which they were eliminated 3: 4 afterwards against Brazil . Otherwise it was always over after the preliminary round. Nigeria is the record winner of the women's African Cup of Nations with eight titles . The U-20 team (nicknamed "Falconets") reached the final of the 2010 U-20 Women's World Cup , where they lost 2-0 to hosts Germany . The national coach is Ngozi Eucharia Uche , who played three World Cup games for Nigeria at the first World Cup in 1991 .

Qualification for the World Cup

Nigeria qualified for the finals by beating Cameroon in the semi-finals of the 2010 African Cup of Nations. Before that, Nigeria had to prevail in five games, starting with qualifying for the African Cup, in which Nigeria beat Ivory Coast twice.

Qualification for the African Cup of Nations 2010

First leg
Ivory Coast	-	Nigeria	1: 2
Return leg
Ivory Coast	-	Nigeria	1: 3

The African Championship took place in October and November 2010 with eight teams in South Africa . In the group stage, each team played once against the other three teams in the group. In the group games, the "Super Falcons" always remained victorious.

Final table of the group stage

rank	country	Gates	Points
1	Nigeria	10: 1	9
2	South Africa	7: 3	6th
3	Mali	3:11	3
4th	Tanzania	3: 8	0

Group stage

November 1, 2010 in Benoni
Nigeria	-	Mali	5: 0 (3: 0)
November 4th 2010 in Benoni
South Africa	-	Nigeria	1: 2 (1: 2)
November 7, 2010 in Tembisa
Tanzania	-	Nigeria	0: 3 (0: 2)

Nigeria won the final against Equatorial Guinea , which was also qualified , with Equatorial Guinea undergoing two own goals. The most goals of all African players were scored by Nigerian Perpetua Nkwocha (11), the oldest participant in the African Championship at 34 years of age. She managed a classic hat trick against Mali and Cameroon .

Final round

November 11, 2010 in Benoni: semi-finals
Nigeria	-	Cameroon	5: 1 (2: 0)
November 14, 2010 in Benoni: Final
Nigeria	-	Equatorial Guinea	4: 2 (1: 0)

Squad for the World Cup

Nigeria's U-20 team celebrated a quarter-final win against the United States in 2010. From the 2011 World Cup team in the picture (from left, with shirt number at the time): Rebecca Kalu (10), Alaba Jonathan (1), Helen Ukaonu (17), Glory Iroka (11), Uchechi Sunday (19) and Osinachi Ohale ( 20). Also participants in both tournaments, not shown here: Ebere Orji (8), Desire Oparanozie (9).

The most experienced players in the Nigerian World Cup squad are Stella Mbachu , who has already played in three World Cup tournaments, as well as Perpetua Nkwocha , Precious Dede and Onome Ebi , who previously played in two World Cup tournaments. Eight players in the Nigerian team gained international experience at the 2010 U-20 Women's World Cup , where they became U-20 vice world champions .

The players have an average height of 1.68 m, with Uchechi Sunday being the tallest player at 1.82 m. Several players are the smallest players in the squad at 1.60 m.

The Nigerian national coach Ngozi Eucharia Uche , who had banned all lesbian players from the national team in the run-up to the World Cup , caused a controversy at the beginning of the tournament . Her comments were translated as follows: “Yes, the lesbians on our team were really a big problem. But since I've been the Falcons trainer, that's all gone. There is no longer a lesbian player on my team. We need divine intervention to control and limit homosexuality. It worked for us. I can't tolerate this dirty way of life. ”After a conversation with Tatjana Haenni, FIFA's head of department for women's football competitions, Uche denied having made these statements.

No.	player	Date of birth	society	International matches	International goals	World Cup games	World Cup 2011
							Sp.	Gates
goal
1	Precious Dede	January 18, 1980	Rivers Angels	73	00	6 (2003, 2007)	3	0	0	0	0
16	Tochukwu Oluehi	05/02/1987	Sunshine Queens	40	00	0 (2007)	0	0	0	0	0
21st	Alaba Jonathan	06/01/1993	Pelican stars	01	00		0	0	0	0	0
Defense
3	Osinachi Ohale	December 21, 1991	Delta Queens	12	00		3	0	1	0	0
5	Onome Ebi	05/08/1983	Duvenciler Lisesi	48	00	4 (2003, 2007)	3	0	1	0	0
6th	Helen Ukaonu	05/17/1991	Sunnanå SK	15th	01		3	0	0	0	0
14th	Faith Ikidi	02/28/1987	Piteå IF	50	00	3 (2007)	3	0	0	0	0
15th	Josephine Chukwunonye	03/19/1992	Rivers Angels	12	00		1	0	0	0	0
18th	Ulunma Jerome	04/11/1988	Piteå IF	38	00	3 (2007)	0	0	0	0	0
midfield
2	Rebecca Kalu	06/12/1990	Rivers Angels	02	01		0	0	0	0	0
4th	Perpetua Nkwocha	03/01/1976	Sunnanå SK	83	41	6 (2003, 2007)	3	1	0	0	0
8th	Ebere Orji	December 23, 1992	Rivers Angels	17th	02		3	0	0	0	0
10	Rita Chikwelu	03/06/1988	Umeå IK damfotboll	40	16	3 (2007)	3	0	0	0	0
11	Glory Iroka	03/01/1990	Rivers Angels	11	00		2	0	0	0	0
13	Ogonna Chukwudi	09/14/1988	Umeå IK damfotboll	13	00	1 (2007)	1	0	0	0	0
attack
7th	Stella Mbachu	04/16/1978	Rivers Angels	88	20th	8 (1999, 2003, 2007)	3	0	0	0	0
9	Desire Oparanoia	12/17/1993	Delta Queens	16	07th		3	0	0	0	0
12	Sarah Michael	07/22/1990	KIF Örebro	09	00		2	0	0	0	0
17th	Francisca Ordega	October 19, 1993	Bayelsa Queens	12	01		2	0	0	0	0
19th	Uchechi Sunday	09/09/1994	FC Neunkirch	03	00		3	0	0	0	0
20th	Amenze Aighewi	11/21/1991	Rivers Angels	05	00		1	0	0	0	0
Coaching staff
Head coach	Ngozi Uche	06/18/1973	Nigeria Football Federation			3 (1991)	3	0	0	0	0
technical consultant	Thomas Obliers	10/21/1967					3	0	0	0	0
Remarks: ↑ Numbers according to the FIFA archive link squad list ( memento of the original from June 25, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  ↑ Information according to the FIFA squad list, updated after the game against Canada. ↑ a b Number according to the FIFA squad list Archive link ( memento of the original from June 25, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  ↑ Status before the World Cup ↑ As a player in 1991

preparation

In April 2011, Nigeria played two qualifying games for the London Olympics against Namibia and qualified for the next round against Cameroon, which will take place in August and September. In addition, two qualifying matches (classified by FIFA as friendlies) for the All Africa Games against Ghana took place. The team arrived in Germany on May 26, but then traveled to the provisional quarters in Austria , where three test matches were played in June.

date	place	opponent	Result	particularities
April 3, 2011	Abuja	Namibia	7: 0 (6: 0)
April 16, 2011	Windhoek ( Namibia )	Namibia	2: 0 (2: 0)
May 1, 2011	Abuja	Ghana	1: 1 (1: 0)
May 15, 2011	Accra ( Ghana )	Ghana	1: 2 (1: 0)
June 3, 2011	Kössen ( Austria )	Czech Republic	1: 0 (0: 0)	1st international match against the Czech Republic
June 7, 2011	Leogang ( Austria )	Austria	1: 1 (0: 1)	1st international match against Austria
June 16, 2011	Eugendorf ( Austria )	Slovakia	2: 2 (0: 2)	1st international match against Slovakia

Group games

In Group A, Nigeria faced France in the first game of the World Cup . The French dominated the game from the start, but Nigeria had the first big chance to score, which the 17-year-old Desire Oparanozie could not exploit. In the 56th minute, Marie-Laure Delie scored the 1-0 winning goal for France with the first goal of the World Cup. It was the first game ever between the two teams.

In the game against world champions and hosts Germany , the Nigerians tried to buy the German players' guts through a deliberately physical game, which was largely tolerated by the South Korean referee Cha Sung-Mi to the displeasure of the audience. This led to a muddled game with few scoring chances on either side. It was only in the 54th minute that Simone Laudehr managed to take advantage of the confusion in the Nigerian defense after a free kick and score the 1-0 winner. Although Nigeria tried to equalize afterwards, they failed to score in the fourth World Cup game in a row and they had to leave the pitch without a win for the ninth time in a row in a World Cup game.

Nigeria ended the group stage with Canada , the 2010 CONCACAF Women's Gold Cup winner . Since both teams had lost their first two games, the game was of no importance for the course of the tournament. There was only one game against Canada that ended 3: 3 at the 1995 World Cup .

Even if it wasn't about anything for either, both teams went down to business with commitment, with Canada having the better start without being able to achieve anything countable. In the 73rd minute, however , Perpetua Nkwocha scored the 1-0 winning goal for the West Africans, who ended their series of nine World Cup games without a win and four World Cup games in a row without a goal.

Nigeria ended the World Cup with just one goal, but only Brazil and Sweden have conceded fewer goals.

rank	country	Gates	Points
1	Germany	7: 3	9
2	France	7: 4	6th
3	Nigeria	1: 2	3
4th	Canada	1: 7	0

Sunday, June 26, 2011, 3 p.m. in Sinsheim
Nigeria	-	France	0: 1 (0: 0)
Thursday, June 30, 2011, 8:45 p.m. in Frankfurt
Germany	-	Nigeria	1: 0 (0: 0)
Tuesday, July 5, 2011, 8:45 p.m. in Dresden
Canada	-	Nigeria	0: 1 (0: 0)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Match Report Nigeria - Equatorial Guinea (PDF; 310 kB).
2. ↑ Match Report Nigeria - Mali (PDF; 319 kB); Match report Nigeria - Cameroon (PDF; 311 kB).
3. ↑ fussball.de: Nigeria's trainer causes the first World Cup scandal. (Original text: "“ Yes, lesbianism used to be a big problem in the team, but since I took over as the chief coach of Falcons, I think the problem has been dealt with. Lucky, some of the girls played with me and they know my dos and don'ts.They know that I cannot tolerate such a nasty practice. ”) Archive link ( Memento of the original from 7 July 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original - and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
4. ↑ Football World Cup: Homophobia Debate on Nigeria's women's team
5. ↑ At first, Equatorial Guinea was qualified as an opponent for Nigeria, but was later disqualified because she had used the player Jade Boho , who had previously played for Spain, in the qualifying games. [1]
6. ↑ Ghana Ladies upset Nigeria to reach All Africa Games
7. ↑ Nigeria's "Super Falcons" arrived in Germany
8. ↑ As the light in the stadium went out shortly before after a power failure and the game had to be interrupted for about ten minutes, the 84th minute for the goal is also mentioned in some match reports. [2]