Preview of the World: Nigeria’s competitive form has recovered recently and remains unbeaten against Gabon

6686 Sports News on November 13th. At 0:00 on November 14th, Beijing time, Nigeria faced Gabon in the semi-finals of the World African Preliminary Play-offs. The two sides met in a narrow road and the winner was eye-catching. This game will be held in Morocco.

According to the relevant rules of the World Cup, all teams are divided into 9 groups. The first place in each group will directly qualify for the 2026 US-Canada-Mexico World Cup. The four teams with the best results (excluding the head-to-head results of the last place in the same group) will enter the second stage of the competition to compete for the qualification to represent the African region in the World Cup play-offs.

In the first stage of the competition, the Nigeria team ranked second in the group with 4 wins, 5 draws, and 1 loss, with 17 points. After excluding Zimbabwe, which was at the bottom of the same group, the score was 15 points, ranking second and fourth in all groups, and qualifying for the second stage. Recently, Nigeria has been in good competitive form. The team has remained unbeaten with 4 wins and 1 draw in the past 5 games, and has successfully kept clean sheets in 3 of them.

Due to arrears of bonuses and other fees, the Nigerian national team once went on strike. However, according to the latest statement from Nigeria captain Ekoon, the Nigeria Football Association has paid off the bonuses owed to the national team players. This also allows the African Eagles to deal with this game without distractions.

Nigeria is a traditional strong team in African football. It has won the World Cup finals 6 times and was shortlisted for the top 16 three times. However, Nigeria failed to qualify for the 2022 World Cup.

In the first stage of the competition, Gabon ranked second in the group with 25 points and 8 wins, 1 draw and 1 loss. After excluding the last place in the same group, Seychelles, it still ranked second in the group with 19 points and entered the second stage smoothly. Gabon's recent performance is also good, with 4 wins and 1 draw in the past 5 games.

The Gabon team is not a traditional strong team in African football and has not qualified for the World Cup so far.

In past encounters between the two sides, Nigeria remained unbeaten with 3 wins and 2 draws.