- Address: Independence Avenue, Abuja
- Country: Nigeria
- Capacity: 60,000
- Opened: 2003
- Main use: Football
- Tenants:
Extra stadium info – Moshood Abiola National Stadium
The construction of the Moshood Abiola National Stadium started in 2000. In 2008, the venue hosted a football match between Manchester United Football Club and Portsmouth Football Club in front of 30,000 fans. Both clubs are from the United Kingdom. Manchester United is among the most popular sports teams in the world. In 1968, they were crowned European champions for the first time in their history after beating SL Benfica from the Portuguese Republic in London.
World championship titles
Manchester United FC won their first world championship title in 1999. They won the title after beating the Brazilian club Palmeiras 1-0. 53,000 people showed up for the game in Tokyo. MUFC won their second world championship title in 2008 after defeating Liga Deportiva Universitaria from Ecuador. The game took place in the Japanese city of Tokyo in front of a crowd of 68,000.
The FIFA U-17 World Cup
The Moshood Abiola National Stadium, which is named after Moshood Kashimawo Olawale Abiola, was one of the FIFA U-17 World Cup venues in 2009. It hosted the first-ever FIFA U-17 World Cup final in Nigeria that year. 60,000 people attended the game. The football match was won by the Swiss Confederation, commonly known as Switzerland, after defeating Nigeria.
The national football team of Nigeria
The national football team of Nigeria, one of the first national football teams with a transfer value of at least $100 million, sometimes use the Moshood Abiola National Stadium for home games. They were crowned African champions several times. In 1980, Nigeria won the African championship for national football teams for the first time in their history. The national football team of Nigeria, nicknamed Super Eagles, won the title after beating Algeria in front of tens of thousands of fans in Nigeria.
The group stage of the 1994 FIFA World Cup
On 22 June 1994, the national football team of Nigeria played their first-ever FIFA World Cup match. Clemens Westerhof, who was born in the Netherlands in 1940, was the manager of the team that day. Nigeria won the match, which took place in the United States of America, 3-0 against the national football team of Bulgaria. The group-stage game was played in the city of Dallas with 44,000 people in attendance. Nigeria lost its second FIFA World Cup game against the Argentine Republic. They won their third FIFA World Cup match against the Hellenic Republic, commonly known as Greece. The second and third FIFA World Cup games of Nigeria both took place in Massachusetts.
The knockout phase of the 1994 FIFA World Cup
The national football team of Nigeria were eliminated by the Italian Republic, commonly known as Italy, in the knockout phase of the 1994 FIFA World Cup. Emmanuel Chinenye Emenike scored the only goal for Nigeria in their match against the Italians. The national football team of the Italian Republic lost the 1994 FIFA World Cup final against Brazil. The Brazilians won the final after a penalty shoot-out.
