AFCON U-20: Eagles coach Aliyu Zubairu unwavered by “Group of death”

Photo Credit - Nigeria Football Federation (NFF).

Nigeria’s U-20 head coach, Aliyu Zubairu has reacted to the TotalEnergies AFCON U-20 draw held in Egypt on Sunday, 13 April.

The Flying Eagles are in Group B alongside two North African powerhouses, Tunisia and Morocco, as well as East African side Kenya.

The tournament is set to be hosted in Egypt following Ivory Coast’s withdrawal and a section of Nigerians have begun to tag the pairing as “Group of Death.” However, Coach Zubairu rules out any form of pressure ahead of the competition.

“I think it is high time we stop looking at some teams as bigger while some as smaller. I don’t think there is any minor opposition in Africa any longer — it all depends on your level of preparation,” he told Soccernet.

“Imagine when the first draw was done, we called it the group of death simply because we were drawn alongside Egypt, South Africa and Morocco. Now we have a new draw that consists of Tunisia, Kenya, with the same Morocco, and we have started saying another difficult group. Which country do we want to play that is not tough? All I will say is how much have we prepared is what should be the issue. Going by what we observed, the team has made a tremendous improvement in terms of blending the team together and adapting a more advanced approach to matches.”

“There is no pressure of any kind. All we are doing is to keep focus to achieve our first target, which is to get the ticket to the World Cup.”

The Flying Eagles will now enter the final phase of preparation in Egypt, where the tournament will run from 27 April to 18 May.