By Daily Sports on October 10, 2016

A first win away from home in nearly two years and against one of the winners of the last three Africa Cup of Nations is not a bad way to kick off 2018 World Cup qualifying.

It was hardly a stroll, though, but there were enough peaks of sunlight in Ndola to suggest that Gernot Rohr is tending the right direction.

Indeed, this game was conditioned by two of his personnel decisions, both of which proved key in establishing dominance for both sides at different points in the game.

The first was a bit of a no-brainer: Alex Iwobi made his first competitive start for the Super Eagles in place of Victor Moses, who had pulled out due to injury.

The second call was a late-ish one, with Wilfred Ndidi coming into the side in place of Musa Muhammed at right-back. The Genk man was raised as a centre-back, but has featured for the Belgian side mostly as a defensive midfielder, from where he has caught the eye mostly for some cracking long range strikes. It seemed an odd decision.

First, and most obviously, Iwobi opened the scoring with a well-executed volley from inside the box. However, his worth to this team in terms of transitioning the ball was apparent; whereas Moses carried the ball at pace against Tanzania and sparred with the full-back, the Arsenal man came inside often and sought to combine with Mikel John Obi and Kelechi Iheanacho in advanced positions.

This was a risky strategy, especially given the nature of the surface in Ndola, and led to some turnovers, but overall his positivity and willingness to move the ball on quickly helped create connections through the middle of the pitch. He played a great pass for Brown Ideye, which the Olympiacos man clipped wide (he was flagged narrowly offside anyway), and was crucial in overloading the central zone which Zambia most wanted to protect.

However, the choice to play Ndidi at right-back was the game’s key decision.

The thinking may have been connected to Zambia’s change of management.

In his pre-match presser, Rohr seemed concerned by the potential for a surprise from Zambia - “We are also aware that they have changed coach (Wedson Nyirenda is in interim charge of Chipolopolo) and should expect a different thing, but the good thing is that they are the same players,” he said - and probably waited till as close to the game as possible to make a definitive choice.

With the Chipolopolo opting to go with two strikers upfront, Ndidi was selected ostensibly to play extremely narrow on the right, almost as a third centre-back.

This was important, as the Super Eagles played quite high up the pitch, pressing from the front and preventing the hosts from building short.

The potential for a 2v2 when they inevitably went long was high, and so Ndidi effectively played two roles: when Zambia hit long into the left half space, he pushed up and aggressively engaged Winston Kalengo, with William Troost-Ekong acting as the spare man; but if they bypassed the press, he engaged tricky winger Fwayo Tembo.

It is no surprise he was rather more successful at the former than the latter.

Tembo caused him problems all through the first half in one-on-one situations, and twice got the better of him, calling Carl Ikeme into action. Also, transitioning between both roles wasn’t always clean, as he was often caught exceptionally narrow, especially if he failed to win the first ball. However, in spite of his poor indiviudal performance, he was structurally key - Kalengo was ineffective, and was replaced just after the break.

The decision by Rohr worked.

There was however a problem afterwards, as Zambia brought on an extra midfielder and went with one forward. This meant Ndidi’s role was now redundant, and while Tembo moving to the opposite flank was respite, he was beaten time and again on the outside by Chisamba Lungu.

Zambia dominated from about the hour mark on, and after Collins Mbesuma seized on Kenneth Omeruo’s error to fire past the excellent Ikeme, the shakiness of the full-backs helped the hosts keep the pressure up on the Nigeria backline.

Rohr’s substitutions however helped take the sting out of the tie: Ahmed Musa’s energy pepped up a flagging forward press, while Anderson Esiti and Shehu Abdullahi helped wrest back control late on, with both moving out in support of their near-side full-back.

Two games is a small sample size, but Rohr’s willingness to make personnel decisions to counter specific threats shows he is not a simple rubber stamp on the team list. It will be very interesting to see how he adapts his team to the might of Algeria next month, but this victory was a crucial message to the rest of the group: the Super Eagles will put up a fight in Group B. (goal.com)

•Photo show Gernot Rohr

Source Daily Sports

Posted October 10, 2016

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