History of Nigeria Super Eagles Team
The Nigeria national football team, popularly known as the Super Eagles of Nigeria represents the country at the international association soccer competition. They are known as the champion team in Nigeria that have a widespread reputation with a number of awards won at the local and international championships.
The team after its foundation, they played the very first recorded official game in England in October 1945 against some amateur football teams in England which included the South Liverpool, Dulwich Hamlet and Bishop Auckland.
Their fame achievements commenced years after when they and won the gold medal in 1973 at the 2nd edition of All-Africa Games hosted in Lagos Nigeria. In the subsequent years 1976 and 1978 the Super Eagles finished 3rd in African Nation's Cup.
The team captained by Chukwu Christian won the 1980 African Cup of Nation as the First championship, beating Algeria 3 – 0 in the final. That was during the 12th edition of the Cup hosted by Nigeria in Lagos.
In 1994, the Super Eagles of Nigeria reached the FIFA World Cup for the very first time. During the competition, the team defeated Bulgaria with a 3 – 0 score, they lost to Argentina in 1 – 2 and then got to the second round knocking out Greece with a 2 – 0 score.
However, in the second round of the competition Emmanuel Amunike scored a goal 25 minutes after the commencement and made the super eagles to take the lead but finally, the game was lost to Italy in a 2 – 1 score.
Again, in 1998 the team competed in FIFA World Cup playing with Spain, Bulgaria, and Paraguay in group D. They qualified after the first round by defeating Spain with 3 – 2 and Bulgaria also but lost to Paraguay. The game later ended in favour of Denmark with a 4 – 1 score.
The Super Eagles of Nigeria won the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, in men's football club event during which they knocked off Mexico, Brazil and Argentina to win a gold medal in Football. They also competed at 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing but lost the match to Argentina.
Super Eagles were drawn to group F in 2002 FIFA World Cup to play with Sweden, Argentina, and England. They completed the game with England with a 0 – 0 draw. Similarly, during the 2010 FIFA World Cup they played with Argentina, Greece and South-Korea they lost against Argentina and Greece but drew the last game with South-Korea in a 2-2 score.
The team participated in 2013 African Cup of Nation held on the 10th of February held at the FNB Stadium in Johannesburg, South Africa. They won the final in the competition with a goal scored by Sunday Mba which ended the game with 1 – 0 score and qualified Nigeria to represent Confederation of African Football in 2013.
Super Eagles have participated in several matches with different countries who have been occasional rivals. In 2013 FIFA Confederation Cup, the Super Eagles team were grouped with Spain, Uruguay and Tahiti.
They had two lost games in the tournament; 1-2 to Uruguay and 0-3 to Spain but then made it up at the end with 6 – 3 to Spain. They also played at the 2014 FIFA World Cup but couldn’t make it at the end of the game.
Another challenge came to the team in 2015 during the African Cup of Challenge tournament held at Godswill Apkabio International Stadium, Uyo Akwa Ibom state, Nigeria. The Nigerian Super Eagles drew the game with a 2-2 score during the first round with South Africa. They finally made a total of 8 points in the game which could not hold them in the position of being the third best-played team because of inability to defend their title.
In 2016, the Nigeria Super Eagles were grouped with Zambia, Algeria, and Cameroon in a group known as "group of death" according to the draw for the 3rd round of the World Cup qualifiers released by The Confederation of African Football on the 24th of June 2016.
In the first match, Nigeria defeated Zambia with 2 – 1 in Ndola and piped off Algeria with a 3 – 1 score in Uyo Akwa Ibom Nigeria during the second match. The team, on the other hand, defeated Cameroon in 5–1 home and away in a back to back contest. They came out as the first African team that was qualified for the 2018 World Cup that will take place in Russia from 14th June to 15 July 2018 after beating off Zambia with 1- 0 in Uyo.
Recently in 2018, a renowned Nigeria football player captain Mikel Obi joined the Nigeria Super Eagles team during their preparation camping at the Eagles’ Ibom Hotels and Golf Resort in Uyo for 2018 FIFA World Cup in Russia, making the team 29 in number.
