Nigeria followed on from Ivory Coast this weekend by winning their opening African Cup of Nations qualifier.

John Mikel Obi and his team-mates beat Madagascar 2-0 at home with the first goal scored by Obefami Martens who now plays his club football in Russia at Rubin Kazan.

The second came when Martins took on a lobbed pass from Mikel and crossed for Michael Eneramo to complete the scoring before the break.

Ghana, without Michael Essien in their side, also won a qualifier, beating Swaziland 3-0.

Back in Europe, Florent Malouda has reacted to France's shock defeat by Belarus on Friday when they lost 1-0 to a country ranked 78th in the world. They face Bosnia-Herzegovina on Tuesday.

'The Fifa rankings tell the story,'said Malouda, who is captain of France for the games.

'We're 21st in the world, we're sliding and we've produced a lot of disappointing performances.

'There's a drop in the level of performance and we didn't just discover that in this defeat. We need to have a hatred of defeat. We'll get back step by step.'