Pinnick Puts The Super Eagles Through A Nightmarish Picnic

by Fotbulnary 

Nigeria missed out on a second consecutive African Cup of Nations after it lost to Egypt in Alexandria on Tuesday in a qualifying round of the tournament that would be hosted by Gabon in 2017. Nigeria was also absent at Equatorial Guinea in 2015 where they missed out on the opportunity to defend the trophy won in South Africa in 2013.

The latest failure has its roots on the maladministration in the Nigeria Football Federation headed by Amaju Pinnick. Before a ball was kicked in the qualifiers in the middle of 2015, the seeds were already sown that the country might not qualify. The uncertainty over the future of Stephen Keshi continued in the early part of 2015 before he was finally confirmed as the coach on a two year contract that would take the country to the next Cup of Nations. With the uncertainty resolved after the mess that was the last qualifiers, the Super Eagles kicked off the qualifying round with a 2-0 win over Chad in Kaduna, with Egypt beating Tanzania in the other match in the group in Cairo.

However, little had Stephen Keshi settled into the two year contract that he signed that he was accused of applying for the vacant position of the Ivory Coast job. Suddenly, he was dismissed on the grounds that he breached the terms of his contract by applying for another job while he was still on the books of the football house.

It was this decision taken by the Amaju Pinnick led NFF board that laid the foundations for Nigeria’s failure to qualify for the next Cup Of Nations. That Keshi was not sacked for football reasons bordering on results on the field of play was bad enough. When he failed to qualify the Super Eagles for the 2015 Cup of Nations, he was not sacked, but because there have been an agenda on the part of Pinnick to get rid of Keshi, something besides football result had to be cooked up.

That Stephen Keshi was sacked was not the real issue, but sacking him in the middle of a qualifying campaign, and replacing him with an inexperienced and rash Sunday Oliseh further compounded what was already a complicated situation.

The former Super Eagles captain started his stint on the job by inviting players that were out of their depth, and completely out of form. For instance, Haruna Lukeman. The appointment of Sunday Oliseh brought about the dismantling of the structure of players that was on ground. Little wonder he fielded what could be term an experimental team when Nigeria were lucky to escape with a goalless draw against Tanzania in Dar es Salaam. Whereas, a settled team would have been able to get a better result.

The struggles of the Super Eagles continued throughout the short reign of Sunday Oliseh because there was another round of experiment of players. Something that is common place in Nigerian football when a new coach is appointed. That Nigeria eventually struggled to overcome Swaziland in a World Cup qualifier late last year only confirmed the fact that he should not have been appointed in the first place.

The way Nigeria exited the CHAN tournament in Rwanda, and Oliseh’s reaction smacked off a coach that was not suited to the job of handling a national team. His temperament eventually got the better of him when he criticised the football house, and the media for the criticism that he came his way since he was appointed. That he eventually jumped before he was pushed caused further disruption for Nigeria’s qualifying campaign.

So Nigeria engaged a third coach for the qualifying campaign when Samson Siasia was brought in to savage what was left of a haphazard qualifying campaign. It was going well in the qualifiers in Kaduna, before the Super Eagles conceded a 91st minute equaliser against Egypt. The qualifying campaign was eventually over when Chad withdrew altogether, it meant Nigeria had to beat Egypt in Cairo, but they lost instead.

The president of the Nigeria Football Federation, Amaju Pinnick should take the blame for Nigeria’s failure to qualify, that the country eventually used three coaches to oversee less than six matches, and still failed to qualify is entirely the fault of Pinnick.

From the short and uneventful spell of Sunday Oliseh, it was clear that it should not have been appointed. The disruption caused by the coaching changes was the foundation of the country’s failure to qualify.

Ordinarily, every picnic ought to be an enjoyable affair, but Amaju Pinnick has succeeded in leading the Super Eagles through a bad and nightmarish picnic through his decisions. And it is one that would reverberate when the draws for the World Cup qualifiers is made. Because, Nigeria will fall further down the FIFA rankings and we can be sure that a difficult group awaits the country on the road to Russia 2018.

At present Nigeria have some exciting players coming through in the mode of Moses Simon of Belgian side Gent, Alex Iwobi of Arsenal, Kelechi Iheanacho of Manchester City, Victor Moses, Odion Ighalo of Watford, Leon Balogun of Mainz. While there are others that have not been discovered.

It is time for the NFF to get a competent coach that would build a team round the players coming through, and from Nigeria’s failure to qualify for three of the last four AFCON tournaments means a local coach is no longer the answer. The quest should be on how to bring in a foreign coach that would make objective decisions and that would have the tactical nous to take the Super Eagles to the next level.