Africa’s only surviving team in the 2026 FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup, Nigeria’s Falconets, continued its impressive run at the championship, yesterday, with a commanding 3-0 victory over England to book a deserving quarterfinals berth.

Tosin Rafiu, Seimeyeha Janet Akekoromowei and Mary Mamudu were on target as Nigeria produced an outstanding all-round performance against the European side.

Rafiu opened the scoring in the eighth minute with a superb individual effort that could emerge as one of the goals of the tournament.

The Nigerian midfielder drove down the left flank before cutting inside and weaving her way through the England defence, eventually firing past goalkeeper Katie Cox.

England had opportunities to get back into the contest, but Nigeria’s goalkeeper Christiana Uzoma proved decisive.

Uzoma produced a brilliant X-block save to deny England forward Princess Ademiluyi before making an even bigger intervention from the penalty spot.

The Nigerian goalkeeper kept out Rachel Maltby’s spot-kick, pushing the ball onto the crossbar and out of danger.

The Falconets then doubled their advantage two minutes after the restart when Akekoromowei produced a composed left-footed volley to make it 2-0.

Mamudu completed the scoring in the 73rd minute to seal a thoroughly deserved victory for Nigeria.

Akekoromowei was subsequently named the Visa Player of the Match.

Nigeria will face the winner of the Poland-Colombia tie in the quarterfinals in Lodz on Sunday.

That quarter-final duel is slated for the Władyław Król Municipal Stadium in Łódź, starting from 2pm Nigeria time.

All other three African teams, Ghana, Tanzania and Benin Republic were eliminated in the group stage.

At the final whistle, Aduku said: “We are very happy with this victory. The girls had a very motivating conference call with the NFF Acting General Secretary on Wednesday night and they promised to go all out today. I am happy they did that.

We will go back to Łódź and aim for victory against either Poland or Colombia on Sunday.”