Super Eagles defender Zaidu Sanusi featured for all 90 minutes to help Porto extinguish AC Milan’s slim UEFA Champions League hopes with a 1-1 draw at the San Siro on Wednesday evening.
Rooted to the bottom of a group that also has high-flying Liverpool and stubborn Atletico Madrid, Milan desperately needed a victory over the Portuguese to claim their first points of the campaign.
But Colombian winger Luis Diaz opened the scoring for the visitors after just six minutes. And despite unleashing Olivier Giroud and later Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Milan could not muster a goal, with Chancel Mbemba’s own-goal gifting them their solitary strike.
Deployed at left-back, Sanusi kept Portuguese attacker Rafael Leao quiet until he was replaced in the 85th-minute by Daniel Maldini.
The draw takes Porto to five points and leaves AC Milan with a point after four games.
It is not all gloom for Milan, though, as they can still qualify if they win their remaining games while Porto and Atletico Madrid pick just a point from their final two matches.
Elsewhere, former Nigerian youth international Abdul Jeleel Ajagun was the hero as Cape Town City edged Chippa United 1-0 at the DHL Stadium, Cape Town, in their South African Premier Soccer League faceoff on Wednesday.
With the game petering out into a stale draw, the 28-year-old midfielder struck the match’s only goal in the 89th minute to hand coach Eric Tinkler’s men their third league win in eight games.
Ajagun’s goal is his first of the season, coming in his seventh appearance of the league campaign. The Port Harcourt-born ace found the back of the net four times in eleven games for the same side last term.
Ajagun was a vital member of the Golden Eaglets side that finished runners-up to Switzerland at the FIFA U-17 World Cup hosted by Nigeria in 2009.
