Nigeria lose 5-4 to Ivory Coast, play Senegal in final group game today

The sand beach Eagles will on Sunday play their last match of the 2014 Copa Lagos against Senegal in order to restore their hopes of retaining the championship they have won the past three times it has held

Now in their fourth appearance, Nigeria lost narrowly, 5-4 to Cote D’Ivoire on Saturday; this following their 7-5 victory over Ghana on Saturday.

The Ivoirians started strong from the flirt blast of the whistle, restraining the Beach Eagles from playing their game and taking the challenge right to the opponents and proved their resilience with a 2-0 lead into the end of the first 12 minutes.

Nigeria resumed the second quarter needing to score goals to meet up and a goal they did get when Abu Azeez converted a spot kick home to reduce the tally 2-1, but that was only to last a while with just 4 minutes played.

Cote D’Ivoire’s number 7 Kouassitchi Daniel put his team two goals in the lead with a stunner at the 7 minute mark, putting the game out of a possible comeback for Nigeria.

In the previous campaigns, Nigeria has been able to make dramatic return from an almost defeat against opponents but against Ivory Coast they could not.

Third quarter resumes and K. Daniel again scored another for the Beach Elephants to go 4-1, at this time; the whole stand is exasperated with the showing on the sandy pitch.

Abu Azeez who had been working tirelessly to get Nigeria into the game got his reward with a double when he slipped one past the right under-arm of the Ivorian goalie, Enam before the end of second quarter

With the scores at 4-2, Nigeria pushed forward for more goals, leaving care to the wind that their opponents may again shock them.

Cote D’Ivoire punished the Eagles for being over-zealous, scrambling through to get a fifth and at this time brought the game to a point of no return for Nigeria; or so it seemed.

Nigeria, however, did fight back in the last minutes of the game; getting a gola from an Isiaka Olawale deflected shot with 7 minutes to go and another from misfiring Najere Musa Tachi with 10 minutes gone already.

Cote D’Ivoire goes top of the log with two wins from two games, having beaten Senegal 6-2 on Friday.

Nigeria needs to beat Senegal who defeated Ghana 5-2 in the first game on Match day 2, in order to stand the chance of defending the title they have won three consecutive times.