- As Rabat Olympic Stadium hosts Group C make or mar showdown
Defending champions, Super Falcons of Nigeria will tonight confront their Egyptian counterparts, the Female Pharaohs, in the final Group C fixture of the ongoing TotalEnergies CAF Women’s Africa Cup of Nations (WAFCON), Morocco 2026, at the Rabat Olympic Stadium with kick-off at 21h00 local time (20h00 GMT).
The holds so much at stake for Nigeria as only a massive victory would guarantee their safe passage into the quarter-finals round of the continental championship. Though the Super Falcons have never lost their final group game, recording 12 wins and one draw, failure to progress today would make them the first defending champions to be eliminated in the tournament’s group stage.
Without mincing words, there is no denying the fact that the Group remains wide open with debutants Malawi leading the pack with six points, while Zambia and Nigeria have three points apiece, and leaving Egypt as they whipping girls with no point to date from the two matches so far played by the teams.
Following a 3-2 defeat to Malawi in their opening game, the Super Falcons bounced back with a 1-0 victory over Zambia, courtesy of an eighth-minute strike by Asisat Oshoala. As things stand currently, Nigeria are placed second in the group, behind Malawi, with their superior head-to-head record over Zambia being the tiebreaker as both teams are locked on three points. This is despite Zambia having a massive goal difference of +5 compared to Nigeria’s 0.
However, the group’s standing would present an interesting scenario if Zambia beat Malawi and Nigeria beat Egypt in today’s encounters. Such results mean the Copper Queens, Super Falcons and Scorchers will all end up having six points. In that case, matches between all three of them would come into consideration when determining who had the best head-to-head record.
Additionally, the top two teams from each group will advance to the quarter-finals with the four semi-finalists automatically qualifying for the 2027 FIFA Women’s World Cup in Brazil, while the losing quarter-finalists will enter playoffs, with two African teams advancing to the Inter-Confederation Playoffs.
Match Facts
Both Nigeria and Egypt will be meeting for the second time at the WAFCON, with their previous clash coming in the third group game at the 1998 edition, when Nigeria won overwhelmingly by 6-0. Available records indicate that the Super Falcons will be playing their 10th WAFCON match against North African oppositions and they have won six of their previous nine games, drawing the remaining three.
Also, Nigeria have never lost to North African opposition in open play and their only defeat came on penalties against Morocco in the 2022 semi-finals following a 1-1 draw at full time. With seven clean sheets in their nine previous WAFCON matches against North African countries, the Super Falcons have scored 31 goals and conceded only three, all scored by Morocco across two meetings.
For the Egyptians, they have so far not enjoyed any stellar performance at the continental tournament. They have lost both their matches at the current tournament and unfortunately have the record of opening a WAFCON with successive defeats for the second time.
In 1998, they also lost their opening two matches, going down 4-1 to both Morocco and DR Congo before losing their final group game 6-0 to Nigeria. The pathetic story line seems to be repeating itself at the ongoing competition as they lost 6-0 to Zambia in their opening match at the current tournament and 3-1 to Malawi in their second.
So far, they have conceded nine goals in their opening two games, the most they have let in across their first two matches at an edition. The previous record was eight in 1998 and six of the nine goals they have conceded have come in the second half, starting from the 60th minute on-wards. All three of the goals conceded in the first half have come from the 25th minute on-wards. – With CAFonline.com
