November 26, (THEWILL) – In January next year, the Super Eagles of Nigeria will learn who they will face in the last playoff round of the 2022 World Cup qualifiers.
During their annual conference, the Confederation of African Football (CAF) announced that pairs for the two-legged playoff matches will be decided by a draw on January 26, 2022.
To determine Africa’s five representatives in Qatar, the 10 group winners from the second round of qualification will play off in a home and away tie.
The draw was supposed to take place on December 18, but it has been pushed back a month. The seeds will be determined using the January FIFA rankings rather than the November rankings.
Nigeria, which is now ranked fifth on the continent, is one of the ten group winners and should be among the top seeds.
The implication of the new date is that teams will have more time to get to know their opponents while the Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) is underway. Next year’s biennial continental competition will be held in Cameroon from January 9 to February 6.
Meanwhile, CAF has declared that VAR will be utilised in all games, which means the Super Eagles could play their home match away from the Lagos Stadium as the continental football governing body stated that any country that does not have VAR facilities will be compelled to play its home games at a venue that does.
The Teslim Balogun Stadium in Lagos, where Gernot Rohr’s team played all of their home games this year, does not have VAR facilities.
The three-time African champions’ other choices are unknown, but a return to the Godswill Akpabio Stadium remains a possibility.
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Jude Obafemi is a versatile senior Correspondent at THEWILL Newspapers, excelling in sourcing, researching, and delivering sports news stories for both print and digital publications.
