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‘Penalty save against Canada was the best moment of my life’ – Chiamaka Nnadozie
By Saheed Afolabi
Nigeria first choice goalkeeper, Chiamaka Nnadozie says her penalty save against Canada marked her best moment of her fast-glowing career at the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup in Australia and New Zealand.
Nnadozie debuted for Nigeria at the FIFA Women’s World Cup in 2019 at the age of 18 and she became the youngest goalkeeper to keep a clean sheet in the competition’s history in France.
Four years later, Canada got a lifeline to silence the Africans in the group B opening showdown but it took a composed and magnificent penalty save from Chiamaka to gift Nigeria a valuable point in the encounter.
Describing her experience when the referee pointed to the spot, the Paris FC goalkeeper admits she had to motivate herself to save the spot kick at that critical moment of the match.
“When the referee went to the VAR screen, I said: ‘It’s a penalty I then said to myself: ‘OK, this is a big day, I just have to try my best, to do the nation proud,” Nnadozie told The Guardian.
“When I saw that it was [Christine] Sinclair that was going to take the penalty, I was a bit scared, because she is one of the best players in the world. But I braced myself and said, ‘Let’s do this.’ And I saved the penalty.
“I was beating my chest, after saving the penalty, because I had kept hope alive. If we had lost that game, I think we would have been on our way back to Nigeria. That day is one of the best moments of my life.”
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