Ruthless Black Stars embarrass Eagles to lift WAFU Cup
Ghana defeated Nigeria 4-1 in the 2017 WAFU Cup of Nations
final on Sunday, avenging an earlier group stage defeat to the Super
Eagles and winning $100 000 in prize-money.
Patrick Razak
proved to be an inspired substitution for the Black Stars, with the
diminutive winger winning two penalties and providing an assist for the
fourth goal.
Nigeria were on the back foot from the first
whistle, and while the defence managed to withstand the pressure for
large parts of the opening half, they offered very little going forward.
The
injury enforced substitution of centre-half Olamilekan Adeleye
coincided with the floodgates opening as Stephen Sarfo opened the
scoring in the 44th minute, impressively controlling the ball before
firing through a sea of bodies. It was the first goal the Super Eagles
had conceded at the tournament and it took 494 minutes to breach their
defence.
Nigeria came out stronger in the second half and
had a lot of the possession, but lacked the cutting edge to get behind a
well-drilled Ghana defence.
Razak had barely been on the
field for 60 seconds when he picked up a loose ball and danced past two
defenders before being clipped by Afeez Aremu just inside the area.
Vincent Atingah netted the resultant spot-kick to double the advantage.
Razak
soon had his second penalty -- Stephen Eze the offender - with Sarfo
this time scoring from the spot to become the top scorer at the
tournament.
And despite the late dismissal of Atingah for
a second bookable offence, the Black Stars still grabbed a fourth; the
outstanding Razak capitalising on some uncertain goalkeeping from Ezenwa
to square the ball for Cobbinah to cap a truly dominant performance. R abiu Ali pulled a goal back for Nigeria with the last kick of the game, but it proved nothing more than a consolation.
Source: kwese.espn.com
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