Nigeria says it had no choice of venue

Johannesburg: The Nigeria football federation says it had no choice over the venue for its World Cup warmup match against North Korea, at which a stampede left 15 people injured, because "FIFA had taken control of all the stadia."

One policeman was seriously hurt Sunday during two separate fan rushes at the Makhulong Stadium outside Johannesburg.

Taiwo Ogunjobi, the Nigerian federation's technical committee chairman, told website kickoff.com that "we had no choice" because "that was the only venue available to us."

Nigeria media officer Idah Peterside said that FIFA and World Cup organizers were not responsible, saying the match "was organized by the two FAs."