Former Big Brother Naija reality star Adekunle Olopade has reacted to the Super Eagles’ semi-final defeat against Morocco, shifting responsibility from the players to the match officials.
In a post on X, Adekunle argued that Nigeria was unfairly denied a victory due to questionable decisions by Ghanaian referee Daniel Laryea.
He highlighted several controversial calls, including a yellow card for Calvin Bassey and fouls against Nigerian players that were ignored.
Olopade praised the Super Eagles’ overall performance, emphasizing that they dominated play and created numerous scoring opportunities.
He encouraged fans to look at the full match rather than focusing solely on the penalty shootout and criticized CAF for remaining silent on the officiating issues.
He wrote: “While Chukwueze’s performance was absolutely terrible, we simply cannot reduce the entire match to just a penalty shoot out.
“First of all, the game wasn’t even supposed to get to penalties. If you didn’t watch the match from start to finish, please don’t involve yourself in this. Nigeria had so many chances, yes it was a tough game but we had the upper hand.”
“The Super Eagles player were ready. Probably even the best form they’ve all been in a while and we were ready. The country was ready.
“But Daniel Laryea with his intentional and terrible officiating robbed us of that match. The ref was whistle-happy, Calvin Bassey did not deserve the yellow card, he stopped a lot of our plays that killed the momentum, ignored Morocco’s one too many fouls on the Nigerian players, and it was clear to see that they played favoritism to the host country.
“This isn’t about country or banter, maybe it influenced his decisions but there were too many wrong calls on the Super Eagles part and CAF shouldn’t be quiet about it.
“Yesterday’s match felt like it was Nigeria against the whole of Africa and sentiments aside, Nigeria was robbed off the win.”
AFCON: Nigeria was robbed – Adekunle slams ref after semifinal loss
