FIFA WWC: Florence Omagbemi backs Nigeria to reach Round of 16

By Saheed Afolabi

Ex international, Florence Omagbemi has backed Nigeria to scale past the group stage of the FIFA Women’s World Cup.

After being drawn in Group B alongside Canada, Australia and Ireland, the Super Falcons will face the Olympic champions on Friday July 21 at the Melbourne Rectangular Stadium, Brisbane.

Former Super Falcons captain believes with the right approach, Nigeria can make it to the next round of the Women’s World Cup as she mapped out a seven points group stage target for the team.

“I believe the Super Falcons can qualify from the group. Absolutely. It depends on the way they approach these games. If Nigeria can get a draw against Canada, put up a good fight against Australia and get a win against the Republic of Ireland, we should come out of that group,” quoted by The Cable.

“The game against Canada can go either way. That is my belief. The Nigerian side is not new to the Canadian team. Most of the games played against Canada have been very close. By now, the team should have an understanding of how the Canadians play. The level of the Falcons and the Canadians are close. If players ignore the distractions of all the off-the-field incidents, they have a huge chance.

“Australia is the team that I think is going to be a big challenge to us in that group. We played against them in Canada in 2015 and lost 2-0. The interesting thing is that the current Australian team is far better than the one that defeated Nigeria in that competition. The Australians are playing at an unstoppable level right now. They beat England in a friendly recently.”

The Super Falcons will be looking to go beyond the quarter final achievement recorded in 1999 before loosing to Brazil through Golden Goal rule.