Details of Nigeria's World Cup qualifiers released with Eagles due to start against Lesotho in November

NIGERIA'S Super Eagles will begin their journey to the 2026 World Cup bid on November 13 this year when they kick off their qualification campaign against Lesotho at the Godswill Akpabio International Stadium in Uyo.

This weekend, the Eagles will play their final group game of the 2024 African Cup of Nations against Sao Tome and Principe in Uyo. However, the match is just a formality as Nigeria has already qualified for the tournament taking place in Ivory Coast next year and the tiny Atlantic Ocean island team are already eliminated, having secured just one point from five games.

More important to the team are the qualifiers for the 2026 Mundial taking place in Canada/America/Mexico in three years time. Nigeria has been drawn in Group C alongside South Africa, Benin Republic, Rwanda, Zimbabwe and Lesotho and will get the campaign going on November 13 in Uyo against the Crocodiles of Lesotho.

On this match day one, while Nigeria will be facing Lesotho, Bafana Bafana of South Africa will be hosting the Squirrels of Benin Republic, while Zimbabwe's Warriors will be travelling to Rwanda to face the Wasps. Matchday two will take place later that month on November 20, with the Super Eagles flying to Zimbabwe to face The Warriors of Zimbabwe, Lesotho hosting Benin Republic and South Africa travelling to Rwanda.

Matchday three will take place on June 2, 2024, when the Super Eagles face South Africa’s Bafana Bafana away. Then, the Super Eagles will travel to Benin Republic to face former coach Gernot Rohr on matchday four, which is likely to be the most anticipated match of the group.

After that, the Eagles will then resume the marathon qualification campaign in March 2025 with a trip to Rwanda followed by a home tie against Zimbabwe. They will then play Rwanda in a rematch in August 2025, followed by a trip to South Africa the following month, with their final group game in October.

Under Fifa's arrangements, the nine group winners automatically qualify for the World Cup and the four best group runners-up will then compete in a play-off stage to determine Africa's representative at the Fifa play-off tournament. This will feature one team from each of Fifa's six confederations, except Uefa plus one additional team from the host confederation Concacaf.