Tunisia stunned Nigeria last night as they won 1-0 to progress to the Africa Cup of Nations quarter finals.
This is more relevant to Nottingham Forest fans then they may think as the player who assisted the winner was their summer signing Mohamed Dräger.
Dräger has not exactly made a name for himself at Forest since joining from Olympiacos for an undisclosed fee on transfer deadline day of last summer. He is yet to make an appearance and has made the bench just once, in the 0-0 draw against West Brom at the end of November.
He has fallen behind the highly sought after Djed Spence, who is on loan from Middlesbrough, in the pecking order.
The right-sided defender, who can also play right wing previously played for Freiburg and Paderborn in the Bundesliga before he went to Olympiacos.
The 25-year-old has made 25 appearances for Tunisia so far in his career, including two at AFCON.
He missed Tunisia’s opening two games of the competition due to Covid but he came off the bench in the 57th minute for their final group game against Gambia, which they lost 1-0.
Tunisia went through to the round of 16 as one of the third placed teams with just one win under their belt and had to face Nigeria, who had won all their group games and were big favourites going into the tie.
They were missing their coach and seven players through covid but overcame the odds to spectacularly win 1-0 thanks to a goal from Youssef Msakni early in the second half.
Dräger started the game at right-back and played the full 90 minutes in the historic victory.
He set up the winner with a cross field pass to Msakni who collected the ball on the halfway line before carrying it forward and smashing it past the Nigeria keeper from distance.
Everton forward Alex Iwobi was then sent off for Nigeria in the 66th minute following a VAR review and Tunisia were able to hold on to their slender lead for a famous victory.
Tunisia now face Burkina Faso in the quarter finals on January 29.
Burkina Faso are ranked 30 places below Tunisia in the FIFA world rankings and Dräger and his teammates will feel very hopeful of getting to the final four.
Dräger will be hoping that his form at AFCON leads to him getting more chances on the pitch for Forest once he returns to Nottingham.
