Nigeria vs South Africa prediction 07.06.2024

• Competition: World Cup Qualifiers, First Stage
• Date: Friday, 7th June, 2024
• Kickoff: 20:00 UTC +1 / 21:00 CEST
• Venue: Godswill Akpabio International Stadium (Uyo)

On Friday evening, in an AFCON Semi-Finals replay, Nigeria and South Africa will face off in the World Cup Qualifiers first stage at Godswill Akpabio International Stadium in Uyo.

Nigeria are one of the best teams in Africa and the vice-champion of the previous AFCON in Ivory Coast, where they lost 2:1 to the host team in the Finals. In the previous World Cup Qualification cycle, the famous Super Eagles failed to qualify as they lost to Ghana in the last stage of the Qualifiers. In this WC Qualifiers, the Super Eagles secured only two points in the first two matches vs Lesotho and Zimbabwe, where they were heavy favorites. Luckily for them, first-placed Rwanda are only two points away.

South Africa are #59 in the FIFA World Ranking List and the 10th-best team in the CAF region. However, they haven't been in the World Cup since 2010, when they were the hosts. In the AFCON, the popular Bafana Bafana had a decent run and eventually finished 3rd. In this Qualifiers, South Africa are 2nd with three points after two rounds, one point away from Rwanda and one point above 3rd-placed Nigeria.

Nigeria vs South Africa pick: Under 2.5 goals

Nigeria have a super-talented offense, but somehow, they are not scoring too many goals, even against much weaker teams than South Africa. In the first two games in the WC Qualifiers, they scored only two goals and were under 2.5 goals on both occasions. Now, they will have some absences of key offensive players, and that definitely won't help. Additionally, Nigeria were under 2.5 goals in ten of the previous 12 matches - 83%.

South Africa are played mostly low-scoring games in recent matches. In the last 17 games in all competitions, they went under 2.5 goals 14 times. Offensively, South Africa were far from impressive, as they scored zero or one goal in four of the last five matches. Their only good offensive display was in the last game against Algeria (3:3). However, they overachieved in that match since they only had 0.56 xG. So, scoring away from home against Nigeria will be a tough challenge.

In the previous h2h game, only four months ago, we saw a 1:1 draw in the ordinary time. Additionally, four of the previous five h2h games finished with fewer than three goals. Considering all the above, we believe that an under 2.5 goals bet is the safest option for this World Cup Qualifier game.