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#2 Nigeria pressurized the Elephants and gained a lot of corners
Moses Simon was Nigeria's assist star today. With a total of 12 crosses and corners taken, he made the Elephants rue his presence on the pitch. Alongside four key passes, he sent in an accurate corner near-post to a waiting Omeruo who headed the ball into the back of the net. It was a well-deserved assist for Simon, who had most of the match to perfect his corner set-pieces.
Nigeria had a total of 10 corners, and it isn't entirely surprising that their solitary goal came from one of them. They maintained pressure on Guinea, forcing the Elephants' tightly composed defence to concede a surprising number of corners. Although Kone was a wall in front of goal, he was unable to stop Omeruo's header that led to Nigeria's qualification and Guinea on the dangerous precipe of exiting the competition.
#1 Guinea was very poor in attacking
With over 90 minutes of gameplay, it would frustrate Guineans to no end that their attacking force was unable to put any real pressure on the Nigerian defence.
The attack was below-par, and to put it into perspective, Super Eagles defensive midfielder Peter Etebo gave three key passes. That's the same amount of key passes the entire Guinea squad made.
Most of the midfield and attack had very poor control on the ball and got dispossessed constantly by the Nigerians. The only bright light for Guinea was Ibrahima Traore dribbling. Captain Naby Keita had a frustrating day and was unable to achieve much from his attacking midfield position.
