Nigeria head coach Eric Chelle urged his squad to focus on beating Lesotho in their penultimate game in the qualifiers for the 2026 World Cup, not on the permutations emerging from the other fixtures in the pool.
The runners-up at the last Africa Cup of Nations go into their game against Lesotho on Friday night in third place in Group C with 11 points.
Benin lead the pack with 14 points ahead of South Africa on goal difference. They play Rwanda, who have 11 points.
As the teams enter the last two games, four nations have the chance of advancing automatically to the World Cup next summer in the United States, Mexico and Canada.
“Now we have the last two games, and our only thinking for now is this game versus Lesotho," said Chelle, who was appointed in January.
"We are thinking of how to win it. After that, people can do the mathematics and try to calculate what happens next. But the reality for now is that we focus only on this game.”
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South Africa penalised
South Africa were in pole position but on 29 September, Fifa, which organises the World Cup, docked the team three points and three goals for fielding an ineligible player in their game against Lesotho in March.
Teboho Mokoena played in the 2-0 win even though he should have been serving a one-match suspension after accumulating two yellow cards.
South Africa face bottom-of-the-table Zimbabwe on Friday and conclude their campaign with a game at home to Rwanda on Tuesday.
“I was disappointed when we knew that points would be deducted that some people started to doubt that we would qualify for the World Cup,” said South Africa boss Hugo Broos.
"Because we were not beaten on the pitch – we weren’t beaten directly by Lesotho or Nigeria. If they had beaten us and people started doubting, then I would understand. This wasn’t the case.”
Broos, who steered Cameroon to the 2017 Africa Cup of Nations title, added: “The only difference is if we hadn’t had points deducted, then we would qualify with the next win. But even with three points ahead, we have to win – and therefore nothing has changed.”
Four African teams qualified so far
The nine winners of the African qualifying groups advance directly to the World Cup.
The four best runners-up across the pools progress to a knockout tournament in November to determine Africa's representative at the intercontinental playoffs.
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On Thursday night, Algeria became the fourth team to book their ticket for the tournament.
Skipper Riyad Mahrez set up both of Mohamed Amoura's goals and also scored in the 3-0 win over Djibouti to take the team to the World Cup for the first time since 2014 – where they lost in the last-16 to eventual champions Germany.
