Victory would be a tonic for troubled Nigeria

Shortly after sunrise yesterday morning in a hotel lobby near the national stadium in Brasilia, a group of Nigerian air force members in full attire were checking in when their laughter started over a simple question.

High-ranking enough to have flown over especially for this game, they were asked if they’d chartered a planeload of money like Ghana had done to the same airport a week before. It turns out they hadn’t.

But a bizarre start, the ending to the day would be just as odd. At a press conference that centred on their bonus payment disagreements rather than their game with France, manager Stephen Keshi responded to an American journalist’s prying by asking, “Do you work for the CIA?”