Nigeria will ignore ‘favourite’ tag in Sunday’s AFCON semifinal – Alex Iwobi

As Nigeria prepare for their semifinal clash against Algeria later today, Super Eagles’ forward Alex Iwobi says Nigeria will ignore “favourite” tag in their approach to the game.

“Normally you have to ignore and not pay attention to it,” Iwobi tells the BBC Sport.

“It’s a hard one to say. There’s still Algeria, Senegal and Tunisia. All four of us are capable of winning. We’ve all got quality players. I wouldn’t know who’s the favourite at this point in time.

“Even though we were able to win two games in the group stage, it wasn’t the greatest performance but sometimes you know you don’t have to play well to win games.

“Against Cameroon and South Africa I’d say we’ve done well, we dug deep. But it’s not the end, we have to continue against Algeria, we are very confident as we are able to beat the holders and a team that beat the hosts.

“It gives us confidence but we will stay with a bit of humility and hopefully go on and win the game.”

Algerians are so far unbeaten in the tournament, unlike the Eagles who lost their third group matches to underdog Madagascar by unreplied two goals.

“We are not worried about the way they’ve played and their unbeaten run. We just have to try and win it. Algeria is one of the great teams in Africa,” he says of the record.

“We know it’s not going to be easy, they’ve got quality players but so do we. It’s going to be a great game to watch, let’s hope Nigeria can do it.

“If we manage to achieve success here, we will go down in history. I know it’s always been our childhood dream to win as many competitions as we can.”

Champions in 2013 before incredibly failing to qualify in 2015 and 2017, there is a feeling in the country that the Super Eagles could achieve a fourth success on the continental showpiece event.

“This is the biggest competition in Africa. Not only are we going to do Nigeria proud, but our own names and family names proud,” says Alex Iwobi. “We just have to go out there and take it one game at a time. Anything is possible.”

The match will take place this night at 8 pm WAT.

BBC Sport