Coach of Benin Republic Gernot Rohr says his coaching staff were shocked when the interim coach of the senior national team of Nigeria Austine Eguavoen kept Moses Simon on the bench in their 1-1 draw in the penultimate game of the AFCON qualifiers, OwnGoalNigeria.com reports.
Eguavoen picked Samuel Chuckwueze to start in the 1-1 draw, before introducing Simon at the start of the second half with his team trailing 0-1. It was the Nantes winger who provided the cross that led to the Super Eagles leveller scored by Victor Osimhen.
Rohr’s team progressed to the AFCON finishing second behind group winners Nigeria, but both team will resume their hostility in the 2026 world cup qualifiers in March with Benin Republic this time around ahead of the Super Eagles with four points.
Benin are on the same point with South Africa and Rwanda respectively but are third in the group on goal difference, Rohr is however wary of 5th place Nigeria saying the availability of top players in the Nigerian team is a huge edge.
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” I was surprised when Simon didn’t start against us (Benin Republic) because he is one of their most important players. But when you have Chuckwueze another top player in a top team you can afford to take some risks. It left us stunned when Simon was not in starting lineup but that is a show of the quality of the team”, the coach said.
” When a team has the amount of big players in big teams like Nigeria. You can’t write them off with lot of games to play. All the teams ahead of them know this and won’t judge them with their present position in the group”.
