By Ade Ojeikere
What happened inside the LA Coliseum in the State of California last week was a representative picture of the deplorable state of Nigeria’s soccer beyond the facade that organisers of the domestic game try to force on us. Last Saturday, the Mexicans thoroughly exposed the underbelly of our football such that in four minutes, a pitiable Nigerian side was trailing by two goals with the technical crew unable to decipher what the problems were. The Mexicans could easily have spelled Nigeria with goals but for the remarkable performance of the home-based goalkeeper, Stanley Nwabali, who plays for Lobi Stars of Makurdi.
However, the goalkeeper was also poor when it came to defending his goalpost in the third and fourth goals. He left his goal line on both occasions unguarded and the Mexicans easily capitalised on it. Jersey number 20, Tope Olusesi and the goalkeeper were identified by the Mexican coach as Nigeria’s best performers in a game where we fielded 14 players, an average which told the story of how poorly and miserable we looked on the night in Los Angeles.
The others escorted Olusesi and Nwabali to Los Angeles raising posers if they were the best players in the domestic game and if the team wouldn’t have played a little better with just the leaders of the league Akwa United FC being fortified with three to four players. Perhaps, Nwabali and Olusesi. Prior to the game, league followers faulted the list of players selected for the exercise and it appears their fears are after all not unfounded. But the one which struck me most was the stoic silence from the top contenders in the league seeking to postpone their matches because some of their regulars were part of the travelling party for the Mexico clash in Los Angeles.
A list of players released for such an assignment that did not attract protests from leading clubs isn’t a representative picture of the best in the domestic game. Perhaps, if the league organisers were alive to their responsibilities, followers of the game at home would have known the difference and raised the alarm over the exclusion of the home-grown stars they would have loved to see them at the international platform based on their performances on live games shown on television. If the league organisers knew their onions, they would have perfected the weekly and monthly awards to deserving league clubs’ players which would have served as the pointers to fault any mercantile list, no matter whose ox is gored. This exercise was once sponsored by one of the soft drinks giants in the country, Pepsi, with distinguished Nigerians serving as panellists.
What happened in Los Angeles was another massive failure to expose our best domestic league players to the world and probably make our country the new Mecca for shopping for raw talents to Europe at cheaper rates. What made our performance pitiable was the absence of quality coaching from the Nigerian bench as the game progressed. The substitutions showed clearly that the coaches were either watching another game or they just didn’t know what to say to the boys to change the way they were playing for improved performances. This, without a doubt, is the fundamental problem with the local leagues irrespective of their nomenclatures. And the NFF, the supervisory body for soccer in the country must remedy the situation, lest our players would just be good enough for the novelty leagues in the world. Need I list the countries where the game isn’t anything other than a novelty?
The decision to deploy some of our former players to serve as coaches without prerequisite coaching knowledge from schools and being graded by FIFA and CAF is grossly affecting the way our local teams play the game. Coaching is a much more serious business to be left for any player to transform from being a regular to become a coach on the altar of being injured or aging or both. Such a player should be encouraged to attend coaching courses. he should always attend FIFA and CAF courses regularly to update their coaching techniques. Coaching, like all disciplines of learning, is dynamic – always evolving with new tricks of the game from the manual to the digital platforms.
The coaching methodologies of our domestic trainers are obsolete. Our coaches train our players as if they are preparing for marathon races. I always laugh watching our players run endlessly around the pitches before training begins. The ones perceived to be unfit are made to do a few laps. The players try to add humour to the exercise by singing religious songs to lift up their spirits. You wonder if this is the way renowned coaches drill their players. You need to watch tapes of how Pep Guardiola conducts his pre-match and halftime chats in the dressing room using the boards. Guardiola virtually dances his way through explaining what he wants to be done even in his smattering English.
Modern-day coaching is about cones, dummies, and other devices found in the club’s gymnasium used to keep players fit. Match preparations are about tactics and roles assigned to special players based on tapes of the opposition’s style of play charted for easy explanation. As matches progress the better side is known through its depth in talents and how the coaches deploy them in his line ups to achieve the desired results. The two semi-finals games in the Euro 2020 competition at Wembley on Tuesday and Wednesday capture the essence of having good coaches who are alive to their responsibilities.
Two years ago, the Confederation of Africa Football (CAF) wrote Nigeria stating that only CAF A should be appointed as head coaches of clubs in the Nigeria Professional Football League (NPFL). You would think that such a request was a piece of cake for the country, given her achievements in world soccer from the kindergartens to the senior cadre. No prize for guessing right that we were found wanting. Virtually all the clubs in the top flight in Nigeria are headed by CAF B licensed coaches with a sprinkle that have their CAF A licenses.
Nigeria Football Association Coaches’ President Ladan Bosso wrote back to CAF chieftains revealing that: “We have only 43 certified licensed CAF A coaches in Nigeria with a large number of these coaches lecturing in various higher institutions in the country and not domiciled with professional football clubs”. Interesting. Of course, couldn’t provide the specifics in order not to further, expose the decadence in the system.
Bosso expectedly pleaded with CAF to give his Association time to effect this new rule which he described as a great idea because for a long period, we have not had CAF A coaching courses in Nigeria pointing out that this has greatly stunted the anticipated progression of our coaches from the CAF C to CAF B and CAF A certifications. Have things changed for the Nigerian coaches since Bosso’s apologetic response to CAF? Read my lips.
NFF President Amaju Pinnick in his first two years tried to take senior coaches in the system to England for training courses. He was shocked to find out that many of them couldn’t even put on the computers given to them nor could they develop programmes with them. They were mostly analogue coaches. It was that bad. The problem with most of our coaches is that have refused to attend FIFA, CAF, and WAFU coaching courses. They shun those courses held in Nigeria on grounds that they have seen it all in the coaching field. Pity. Dear Nigerian coaches, learning is a continuum. The day you stop learning, you are dead in such a profession.
Nigerian coaches are rustic in their style of coaching. And it permeates through all the levels hence the dearth of talents here. The country’s football needs holistic retooling for it to compete with the best in the world. No sentiments. What we have done in the last three years is to paper the cracks in the coaching industry.
In the past we had trained Coaches such Alabi Aissien, Adegboye Onigbinde, the late Willy Bazuaye, Monday Sinclair, Eto Amaechina, Josiah Dombraye, Godwin Etemike, Carl Odywer, the late Joseph Ladipo a.k.a Jossy Lad, the man who made defunct Leventis United FC of Ibadan, the greatest brand in our country, having emerged from the third tier till the top, Sebastine Brodericks-Imasuen, Amusa Shittu, Ufere Nwakwo, Charles Bassey, the late Solomon Ogbeide, Ben Duamlong, Lawrence Akpokona, the late Kelechi Emetiole including foreigners such as Kowalick (I hope I got the spelling right),who handled Enugu Rangers, Allan Hawks, whose off-side tactics was a delight to watch as it caught unprepared teams to their consternation. In fact, coaches of the Eastern team (Enugu Rangers, Spartan of Owerri, Vasco Da Gama, Sharks FC, Blue Angels), made the competition among teams keener and exciting.
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