2023 AFCON Qualifiers: Super Eagles to now face Mauritius

The Super Eagles of Nigeria will now face Mauritius instead of São Tomé and Principe in the 2023 Africa Cup of Nations qualifiers, Completesports.com reports.

The confirmation of Mauritius as one of the teams placed in Group A alongside Nigeria, Guinea-Bissau and Sierra Leone was published on the Super Eagles verifies Twitter handle on Monday.

Confederation of African Football (CAF) disqualified São Tomé and Principe, from the qualifiers for fielding an ineligible player against Mauritius during their preliminary round fixture.

Following the development, the Eagles will now face Mauritius in their second game in the qualifiers.

“We will now play Mauritius in our 2nd match of the AFCON 2023 qualifiers,” it was written on the Eagles Twitter handle.

Two teams from the group will qualify for the 2023 AFCON edition to be hosted by Côte d’Ivoire.

The first time Côte d’Ivoire hosted the AFCON was in 1984 which was won by Cameroon.

The qualifiers will run between 30 May 2022 and March 2023.

Meanwhile, newly-appointed coach of Nigeria’s Super Eagles, Jose Peseiro, has been handed a one-year short term contract, as he begins his reign as the head coach of Nigeria’s Senior Men’s National team.

Contrary to speculations, the Portuguese coach was only handed a 12 months deal, which is subject to renewal based on performance-related clauses.

With the NFF facing a legal battle on payments for erstwhile coach of the team, Gernot Rohr, all pointers are the Federation are weary of allowing thunder strike in the same spot.

Peseiro will lead the Eagles in the United States when the team faces Mexico and Ecuador in international friendly games. He will be assisted by Ex-Eagles winger Finidi George, Salisu Yusuf and Usman Abdallah.

The former Venezuela and Saudi Arabia national team coach comes in as the substantive replacement for Franco-German coach, Gernot Rohr, whose contract was terminated by the Nigeria Football Federation, NFF, after five and half years of handling the three-time African champions.