The skillful striker came in, in the second half as a substitute for the Newcastle United striker, Shola Ameobi, who incidentally was also like Nwofor, appearing for Nigeria in his second international competition.
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| Obinna Nsofor of Nigeria |
Within three minutes of Nwofor's coming into the match he showed the fans why a couple of English Premier League (EPL) sides wants him to join them. His first goal on the 49th minute was a beautiful, amazingly skillful back-heel, which had spectators up from their seats. It was pure talent.
He netted the second goal for Nigeria on the 68th minute of the match. Though the match was a friendly to honour the legendry Nelson Mandela, the Super Eagles took the game very seriously.
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Nigeria was the better of the two teams, and had much better finishing, than their wastful chances infront of goalkeepers, at last month's Confederation Cup tournament in Brazil. One wonders whether Uche Nwofor, could have done better, in taking multitude of chances created in the tournament, if he was invited by Stephen Keshi.
South Africa played very well in the first half and in the beginning of the second, until Uche's wonderful back-heel goal was registered. After the goal, the Bafana Bafana seemed like, they were playing catch up. But when they conceded the second goal, it became a bit hard for them, as they found it difficult to break the Nigerian defence.
But credit to the Bafana Boys, they kept on fighting to pull at least one goal back but they were giving no space for that.
At the end of the match, the South Africa coach, Gordon Igesund, said,
"I'd like to congratulate Nigeria, they beat us convincingly and I think they deserve their victory."
"Throughout the game, especially in the last third, they were much better than us, they used the ball better and they were more patient. I think we created a couple of chances, especially in the first half, but we just couldn't get on the end of them," he said.
"In the second half they scored the goal that made us chase the game, and after that the second goal game.
"We kept trying to get back into the game, but I think the difference between the two teams was our play in the last third." Mr Igesund, saw the match as a good preparation for their next friendly match against Burkina Faso and also their World Cup qualifier next month.
"It was a good exercise for us because we need to play teams like Nigeria. They are very strong team with good players, who play at a high level and it was a good test for us."
He added, "We can only improve, you can see they've been playing against good opposition and we need to continue doing this in order to grow."
On his own part after the match, the Nigerian coach, Stephen Keshi, who was obviously very happy with the result of the game said, "With due respect, Bafana Bafana are a good side."
"A lot of potential in the team. But we wanted to do something and make our nation proud and make ourselves proud and I'm proud of the kids, mostly in the second half, when we did very well," he said.
Keshi thinks that the match was a good test for the Super Eagles' World Cup qualifier match against Malawi in Nigeria on the 7th of September. Nigeria is on top of the table with two points difference and Malawi in the second position. Nigeria needs a draw to qualify while Malawi need a win.
"This will keep us in shape for the game against Malawi in three weeks,"
Keshi concluded.
As afore mentioned, the match was a very good test for the two countries, as they are preparing for their decisive World Cup qualifiers.
With this winning, Nigeria has continued their dorminance of South Africa in international football. The two countries had now met eight times, in competitions and Nigeria has won six times, lost once and drew once.
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