Golden Eaglets of Nigeria
Eko Hot Blog reports that The Nigeria Football Federation has announced that the men’s U-17 team, the Golden Eaglets, will not participate in the 2025 U-17 AFCON in Ivory Coast and, consequently, will miss the 2025 U-17 World Cup in Qatar.
Garba’s team achieved a 3-2 victory over Ghana in the third-place match on Tuesday, but it wasn’t sufficient to secure a spot.
Initially, the NFF had stated that the purported expansion of the 2025 tournament had ensured their qualification.
Since their 1-0 semi-final defeat against Ivory Coast last Saturday, there has been a nervous wait to learn the team’s fate.
The decisive blow came on Tuesday when CAF confirmed that the U-17 AFCON would remain a 12-team tournament.
“The Confederation of African Football has clarified that next year’s Africa U-17 Cup of Nations will still have 12 finalists in attendance.
“As against the minimum of 16 teams being projected by African football enthusiasts.
“This means that despite defeating host nation Ghana in Tuesday’s third-place match of the WAFU B U-17 Championship.
“The Golden Eaglets of Nigeria have not qualified for the finals,” the NFF said in a statement obtained by Punch correspondent late Tuesday.
The NFF added that CAF’s Director of Competitions, Samson Adamu, confirmed that only 12 countries will qualify for Ivory Coast 2025.
Expectations had been high among African football enthusiasts that the 2025 U-17 AFCON would expand.
Following FIFA’s allocation of 10 slots to the continent for the 2025 World Cup at its Congress in Bangkok.
Qatar will host five consecutive FIFA U-17 World Cup finals starting next year, with each tournament featuring 48 teams.
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