The Nigeria national football team, nicknamed the Super Eagles or Green Eagles, is the national team of Nigeria and is controlled by the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF). The team has ranked as high as 5th in the FIFA World Rankings, in April 1994. They won a gold medal at the 1996 Summer Olympics and the Africa Cup of Nations on two occasions, and have reached the FIFA World Cup finals four times.

After playing other colonies in unofficial games since the 1930s, Nigeria played its first official game in October 1949, while still a British colony. The team played warmup games in England against various amateur teams like Dulwich Hamlet, Bishop Auckland and South Liverpool. The team's first major success was a gold medal in the 2nd All-Africa games, with 3rd place finishes in 1976 and 1978's African Cup of Nations to follow. In 1980 the team had such players as Leyton Orient's John Chiedozie and Tunji Banjo, and the Muda Lawal / Christian Chukwu-led Super Eagles won the Cup for the first time in Lagos. In 1984 and 1988, Nigeria reached the Cup of Nations final, losing both times to Cameroon. Three of the four African titles won by Cameroon have been won by defeating Nigeria. Missing out to Cameroon on many occasions has created an intense rivalry between both nations. Two notable occasions; narrowly losing out on qualification for 1990 World Cup and then the controversial final of the 2000 African Nations Cup where a goal scored by Victor Ikpeba during a penalty shoot out was disallowed by the referee.^{[citation needed]}

Ali Baba (Arabic: علي بابا‎ ʿAli Bāba) is a fictional character from medieval Arabic literature. He is described in the adventure tale of Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves.

This story has been used as a popular pantomime plot such as in the pantomime/musical Chu Chin Chow (1916). Like many other folk tales frequently adapted for children, the original tale is darker and more violent than the more familiar bowdlerised versions. Popular perception of Ali Baba, and the way he is treated in popular media, sometimes implies that he was the leader of the "Forty Thieves": in the story he is actually an "honest man" whom fortune enables to take advantage of the thieves' robberies.

Some critics believe that this story was added to One Thousand and One Nights by one of its European translators, Antoine Galland, an 18th-century French orientalist who may have heard it in oral form from a Middle Eastern story-teller from Aleppo, in modern day Syria. In any case, the first known text of the story is Galland's French version. Richard F. Burton, however, claimed it to be part of the original One Thousand and One Nights.

Stephen Okechukwu Keshi (born January 31, 1962 in Lagos) is a former football defender from Nigeria.

An important player for Nigeria, Keshi was captain of the squad for the 1994 FIFA World Cup and played in five different African Nations Cup tournaments, helping to win the 1994 African Nations Cup.

His last club was Perlis FA in Malaysia. In 2000, a testimonial match was arranged for him in Lagos, Nigeria.

After a playing career mostly with Belgian clubs, Keshi went to the United States to be educated in coaching.

In 1996 he was joined by Augustine Eguavoen, who once coached the Nigerian national team. They played together in California as the backbone of the defense for the short-lived Sacramento Scorpions. Keshi has been a part of the coaching staff for the Nigerian national team, most notably as head coach for the Junior Eagles at the 2004 Olympic soccer tournament.

Between 2004 and 2006 Keshi coached the Togo national football team, unexpectedly bringing them to their first World Cup tournament, Germany 2006. Having secured Togo's unlikely qualification, he was promptly replaced by German coach Otto Pfister prior to the World Cup finals, after Togo showed a dismal performance and failed to advance to the tournament stage in 2006 African Cup of Nations in Egypt.

Victor Nsofor Obinna (born 25 March 1987 in Jos, Nigeria) is a Nigerian footballer who plays as a second striker for FC Lokomotiv Moscow.

Obinna in Igbo, literally means "Father´s heart". He played for Chievo in Italy's Serie B, having played regularly in Serie A with the club until their relegation in 2007. He made his full international debut for Nigeria at the 2006 African Cup of Nations, scoring once in three appearances as his side were eliminated in the semi-finals. Obinna celebrates by doing a cartwheel-to-2 hand aided backflips-to-backflip somersault.

Obinna played for Nigerian clubs Plateau United and Kwara United were he was discovered by FIFA agent Marcelo Houseman, he went on trials with Italian clubs Internazionale, Perugia and Juventus before signing with Brazilian club Internacional, but international clearance problems meant that the transfer was never finalised. He rejoined Enyimba to take part in their domestic league campaign and CAF Champions League defence.

Obinna was signed by Italian club Chievo on a five-year contract in July 2005. But also reported that Chievo formed an agreement with Inter that Obinna first registered as Chievo player in order to use the non-EU registration quota of Chievo, like Júlio César in 2004–05 season. Then he would be call back to Inter.