The fortunes of Nigerian female soccer have been on the decline in the last few years with little or no effort being made to reinvigorate the senior national team, the Super Falcons, for them to measure up with their counterparts in the world. Because of their lacklustre performance, the Falcons are no longer Super.
Though they are the current African champions, having won the African Women Championship, AWC, for a record ninth time in 2014, the Nigerian ladies have not been able to replicate their seeming dominance in Africa on the world stage. Even in Africa where they are seen as the soccer powerhouse, they are no longer a force to reckon with in recent times.
Only last weekend, the Falcons were denied a ticket to play in the 2016 Olympic Games by Equatorial Guinea. They lost 2-1 in extra-time to Equatorial Guinea on Sunday and crashed out 3-2 on aggregate, having played 1-1 draw at home in Abuja. The team also failed to make the 2012 Olympics in London due to their poor outing in the qualifying series.
They had the worst campaign at the last FIFA Women’s World Cup held in Canada this year. They failed to make it past the first round of the tournament, where Cameroon’s Indomitable Lioness shone. The Falcons woefully failed to make it to the knockout stage in the last four editions of the World Cup. The last time the team progressed from the group stage was at the USA 1999 Women’s World Cup.
They will face another acid test in a couple of weeks at the All Africa Games. The Games come up in Congo Brazzaville in September. Though they won the gold medal of the women’s football event of the Games at the Abuja 2003 and Algiers 2007 editions of the tournament, they could not …Read More
Source:: PM Newspaper
