Super Eagles captain Wilfred Ndidi says Nigeria are determined to avoid a repeat of their painful defeat to Tunisia when the two sides meet at the 2025 Africa Cup of Nations on Saturday, Footynaija.com reports.
Nigeria and Tunisia both won their opening Group C matches and sit joint-top on three points, with Tunisia holding the advantage on goal difference. A win for either side at the Fès Stadium will secure automatic qualification to the knockout stage.
However, memories of their last encounter still linger. At AFCON 2021 in Cameroon, Nigeria went into the round-of-16 clash as favourites after winning all three group matches, while Tunisia progressed as one of the best third-placed teams. Despite that, Tunisia stunned the Super Eagles with a 1-0 victory.
Speaking at Friday’s pre-match press conference, Ndidi admitted the defeat is still discussed within the squad.
“The guys are really prepared, we don’t want to think about what happened (previous clash), we just want to face this one because definitely it’s a new team with good players, good group,” he said.
“We are talking about it (defeat to Tunisia at 2021 AFCON), we actually spoke of it and hopefully it is not going to happen the second time.”
Ndidi also played down suggestions that Nigeria are under pressure to win the tournament following their failure to qualify for the 2026 World Cup.
“There’s no pressure on us, no pressure at all,” he said.
“We didn’t qualify for the World Cup but we are actually ready for this tournament, it’s just like another opportunity to correct the wrong.”
Kick-off is at 9pm on Saturday in Fès.
