By

Eniola Olatunji 

Nigeria’s Flamingos in the early hours of Wednesday at the Estadio Felix Sanchez, Santo Domingo dismissed hosts and debutantes, Dominic Republic from the 2024 female U17 world cup with a long range inter Ballistic missile from 24 meters away to march gallantly into the quarterfinals from group A.

Shakirat Moshood scored the coveted goal in the 89th minute when she got Opeyemi Abdulwahab assist. It was her 4th goal in the tournament having gotten a brace against Ecuador and a goal against New Zealand. Opeyemi too scored against New Zealand.

Nigeria’s Manager, Oloowokere had planned the match for training his words resting his lethargic legs of Chidi Harmony and Effiong Peace until he got a signal reminding him that Nigeria strongly desires full 9 points at the round stages before he brought in Harmony for Ramotalahi Kareem and Peace for Aishat Animasaun both in the 64th minute.

Nigeria really trained with the no match materials in Dominic Republic babes making 41-3 shots at goal; having 13-1 shots on target meaning the Nigerian defence turned the Nigerian goal mouth to a ‘Ba Shiga’ (No go area) for the Dominicans; Nigeria made a marvelous 73-27 possession and stringed 420-170 passes meaning it was total domination of the Domincans in the match that Ref Daiane Muniz of Brazil issued no yellow or red cards and Nigeria still had 17-0 corner kick advantage probably showing mercy to the hosts for their efforts.

In the other group match, Ecuador whitewashed New Zealand 4-0 making two goals per half with Arbleda Oritz scoring in the 41st minute from a Caprice Chiuchiolo connect and Chiuchiolo herself got the 2nd goal in the 43rd minute from a Guerra pass. VAR rejected their 3rd goal in the 44th minute.

On resumption of the 2nd half, Chiuchiolo got her brace scoring the 3rd goal for Ecuador in the 49th minute and Moran Gurumendi topped the goals tally up with the 4th in the 79th minute from Fierro Lara assist.

In the first round, Nigeria caged New Zealand 4-1 and Ecuador silenced hosts Dominican Republic 2-0 while in the 2nd round, Nigeria again tamed Ecuador 4-0 when Dominican Republic drew 1-1 with New Zealand.

Nigeria tops Group A with 9 points scoring 9 goals and conceding 1; Ecuador bagged 6 points scoring 6 goals and conceding 4; Dominican Republic has a point scoring just a goal and conceding 4 while New Zealand got a point scored 2 goals and conceded 9.

Look at the results of the Nigerian matches at the 2022 games. Nigeria won Bronze in India when she beat same Germany 3-2 on penalties after 3-3 at full time at Patil stadium Navi Munbai. Nigeria lost the semifinal to Columbia 5-6 on penalties after a goalless full time at Margao. At the quarterfinal, Nigeria played 1-1 with the USA at full time and moved on via 4-3 penalty shootouts. She lost to Germany 1-2; bashed New Zealand 4-0 and dismissed Chile 2-1 at the Group B stages.
Apart from the Bronze medal, Nigeria was quarterfinalists in 2010, 2012 and 2014.

 Nigeria will play the first quarterfinal against USA on Saturday at 8:30 pm going back to the stadium of their first two matches at Santiago de los Cabelleros while Ecuador will test might against Spain in the 3rd quarterfinal on Sunday by 8:30 pm at Santiago Domino.

Today Wednesday, at 2100 hours in group D, Japan will meet Brazil while North Korea will face Kenya. At midnight of Wednesday, all the group C matches will end with Zambia trying to regain freedom from Poland and England proving superiority over Mexico.