Can one aptly tag it a game of numbers? That seems to be what is happening in the Group C matches of the ongoing African Nations Championship in Rwanda. Last Friday’s encounters literarily threw the group open as all the four teams, including the bottom-positioned Niger Republic, have arithmetical chances of advancing to the quarter finals.
Super Eagles only have an edge as a drawn game will see the Super Eagles through with five points. The other three teams in the group need outright win in their respective matches to scale through.
Guinea will target a win to claim five points thus truncating Nigeria at four points. Should that happen, Nigerians will wish that the Tunisia and Niger Republic match ends in a draw. A win by Guinea gives the Syli National five points; putting Nigeria in danger should Tunisia beat Niger Republic in the other encounter that will be played concurrently with the West African clash of Nigeria and Guinea.
But should Niger Republic beat Tunisia to amass a total of four points, the northern neighbours of Nigeria will scale through if Nigeria draw or beat Guinea. What a game of numbers!
But more significantly, when the Super Eagles face Guinea, the African Nations Championship will hit a milestone of 100th match since the competition kicked off February 22, 2009 with a Cote d’Ivoire versus Zambia encounter. This brings to focus, the myth of numerology.
The Nigeria-Guinea encounter may as well also produce the 200th goal of the tournament. But that is not the focus. Reviewing Nigeria’s 4-1 defeat of Niger Republics reveals Chisom Chikatara as the only other player to score a hat trick since the inception of the tournament.
The first hat trick scorer was Zambia’s Given Singuluma whose three goals within 14 minutes against hosts Cote d’Ivoire was equalled by Chikatara who performed his own feat almost within the same time frame.
But the allure of Chikatara’s hat trick has to do with the jersey number he wore. His shirt number is 13, a number widely believed to evoke bad luck. The number 13 is always attached with unlucky association. Thirteen is so disliked that many cities do not have a 13th Street or a 13th Avenue, many high-rise buildings avoid having a 13th floor, some hospitals avoid labelling rooms with the number 13 and many airports will not have a gate 13.
In support of the myth around figure 13, reference is often made to the Bible where Judas Iscariot, the 13th guest to arrive at the Last Supper, was the person who betrayed Jesus.
That the Apollo 13 was the only unsuccessful moon mission has also been cited to support the myth around number 13. The myth is also stronger when it has to do with date, especially if it is a Friday.
It was on Friday the 13th of February in 1976 that Nigeria’s Head of State, Gen. Murtala Muhammad was killed by mutineers. Also, Friday, October 13, 1972, was a bad day in the history of aviation. That’s the day that Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571 infamously crashed in the Andes, killing 29 people. On the exact same day, 174 people were killed when a Soviet Aeroflot crashed in a lake about a kilometre from the runway.
Last November 13, a Friday, is infamously remember for the series of coordinated Paris terrorist attacks including that of the famous Stade de France where a scheduled friendly international match was to hold. Close to 150 people were killed.
On account of this, some players avoid wearing shirts with number 13. But it was that shirt number that Chisom Chikatara wore when Nigeria demolished Niger 4-1 last Monday. In doing so, he became the tournament’s second player to score a hat trick. In the 1-1 draw with Tunisia on Friday, the man with the ‘unlucky number’ was already primed to be the tournament’s top scorer.
If Chikatara scores tomorrow, he will be the next player after South Africa’s Bernard Parker to score in three consecutive matches of CHAN group games. Parker’s goals were however from the penalty spot.
He may as well go ahead in the competition to replicate the feats of Italian-Uruguayan, Alcides Ghiggia and Brazil’s Jairzinho who scored in every match of the 1950 and 1970 World Cup finals respectively.
Chikatara is not the only Nigerian having 13 as magic number. Coach Sunday Oliseh does, just as his special assistant on technical matters, Tijani Babangida.
Oliseh is the 13th Nigerian to be appointed the coach of the national team. As a player, he led the Super Eagles to become the first qualifier, outside the hosts, for France ’98 World Cup. One significant fact of the qualification was the role of figure 13.
Nigeria qualified for France ’98 amassing 13 points even with a match at hand in the qualifying series. The Super Eagles got launched into qualification mood through a 13th minute goal from an unlikely scorer, Sunday Oliseh. It was his first ever goal for Nigeria after over 20 caps since his debut in the 6-0 defeat of Ethiopia in 1993. His next goal for Nigeria was scored 13 minutes to the end of the Nigeria’s opening game with Spain. The Super Eagles beat Spain 3-2.
Significantly, Nigeria’s total World Cup goal-haul stood at 13 at the close of the France ’98. That 13th goal was scored by Tijani Babangida, wearing shirt number 13. It came 13 minutes to the end of the 4-1 loss to Denmark. Significantly too, the total number of goals Nigeria conceded at the World Cup stood at 13 at the close of France ‘98.
The magic of shirt number 13 is not peculiar to Chikatara in the national team. Former Lagos ACB forward, Godwin Iwelumo was famous for the shirt number 13. He scored in his debut for Nigeria in a 1978 All Africa Games qualifiers against Benin Republic on February 14, 1977. Subsequently, Iwelumo was famous for always scoring Nigeria’s goal number two. Chikatara is the latest shirt number 13 sensation. Who says 13 is an unlucky number?
CHAN HITS 200TH GOAL MARK
When Morocco’s Abdelghani Mouaoui shot his side ahead after 16 minutes in yesterday’s Group A encounter with hosts, Rwanda, it was a milestone in the seven year old African Nations Championship.
The goal was the 200th since Zambia’s Given Singuluma opened scoring in the tournament’s first match in Abidjan. Singuluma who scored a hat trick in the encounter against hosts, Cote d’Ivoire later emerged as the tournament’s top scorer with five goals.
The only other hat trick achiever of the tournament, Nigeria’s Chisom Chikatara already has four goals. The 100th goal of the tournament was scored two years ago in South Africa by Ghana’s Theophilus Annorbaah in a 1-0 defeat of Congo.
Meanwhile, the two pre-tournament matches played by Nigeria against Angola and Cote d’Ivoire may not count in the ranking to be released by FIFA on February 4. It is either the matches were not counted as official matches owing to the atmosphere which had semblance of practice matches or the football associations involved did not notify FIFA. Nigeria beat Africa’s leading team, Cote d’Ivoire and drew 1-1 with Angola.