Super Falcons centre-back, Osinachi Ohale has closed the book on her international career, announcing her retirement from the Super Falcons on Friday after 16 years in green and white.
The 34-year-old centre-back leaves with 86 caps, four FIFA Women’s World Cup appearances and seven WAFCON tournaments, five of them ending in continental titles.
Few defenders in Nigerian football history can point to a résumé that spans that many major tournaments, and fewer still have done it across a decade and a half of the game’s biggest transitions.
Ohale made the announcement in an emotional statement on Instagram, describing the choice to step away as one of the hardest of her career despite everything she’d given the game over the years, and thanking Nigeria for the chance to live out her dream in the national shirt.
Ohale’s statement leaned on thankfulness rather than farewell. She ran through her own numbers, 86 caps, 16 years, four World Cups, seven WAFCONs, five titles, before framing the true reward as simply having had the privilege of serving her country.
She closed with a promise that the jersey might come off her shoulders, but never her heart.
The tributes from within the Super Falcons dressing room came quickly. Asisat Oshoala and Michelle Alozie both called her a legend, while Onome Ebi, who spent years alongside her at the heart of defence, described Ohale as her best-ever number six.
