SUPER EAGLES' AFCON FIASCO: A DISASTER FORETOLD- Steve Austin Nwabueze

SUPER EAGLES’ AFCON FIASCO: A DISASTER FORETOLD- Steve Austin Nwabueze

The long faces, the exasperated sighs from both fans and players alike, the anguished frown of the gaffer etched conspicuously on his furrowed brows, the intent gaze of some of the NFF officials present at the magnificent stadium in Alexandria gazing absent mindedly at the pitch which was filled with jubilant Egyptian players and officials celebrating their qualification for the African soccer show piece all tell the story; the Eagles’ wings have been clipped. There would be no parting of the Red sea. There would be no Passover to the Promised Land. The Eagles would not sight let alone cross over to the Promised Land. 

 Where did it all go wrong? Who are the dramatis personae in this show of shame? Who do we finger in the ensuing blame game for all this? These questions and more raise more posers than answers for me. The palpable feeling of de javu was there for all to see and was indeed seen by those who refused to be blinded by patriotism and saw the cracks before they became manifest. The gung-hoo mind games adopted by interim gaffer, Samson Siasia before the double header failed to galvanise the team as expected. He talked the talk but did he exactly walk his talk? It is unbelievable that in the tempestuous period under reference, the Super Eagles had had a change of baton for both coach and captain, three times. Three coaches, three captains; those were what it took the Nigeria Football Federation to prosecute this fiasco misnomerly called qualifiers. Stephen Keshi, Sunday Oliseh and Samson Siasia on the one hand as coaches and Vincent Enyeama, Ahmed Musa and Mikel Obi as captains, all got their bites at the cherry. So what happened to stability? What happened to continuity? 

For 9 months the powers that be in the NFF kept playing Russian roulette with our football typified by characteristic knee-jerk reactions and erratic behavior, Nigeria made it a hat-trick of non-qualification in four years for Africa’s biggest soccer show fest having previously failed to qualify in 2012, 2015 & 2017. Accusing fingers would readily point at the likes of Oliseh but can we just take a back seat and reflect for once?  This article is an expose of the factors that caused the present rot and I would try as much as possible to offer a prognosis to the malaise. At the centre of all these meltdown is the Nigeria Football Federation which was more interested in politicking than doing their job. The avoidable distraction caused by the Oliseh saga certainly didn’t help matters. The NFF managed to pay outstanding match bonuses to players during the latest match assignment and then you wonder what happened to team morale. Questions would certainly be asked as to the decision behind the choice of Kaduna as a venue for the all important tie. How did other departments that played a part in all this fare?

The Players

How many of our players play regularly for their clubs in Europe? Am not particularly interested in the clout of the club. How many of our boys on display play week-in week-out? Mikel Obi until the appointment of Guus Hiddink by Chelsea was a perennial bench warmer and has refused and or neglected to seek more playing time elsewhere. The likes of Onazi on the average makes just one or two substitute appearances  for Lazio in the Serie A.  The new lads in Iheanacho and Iwobi are established fringe players for City and Arsenal respectively. Moses Simon is not a regular for Genk in Belgium same goes for Victor Moses for West ham. That leaves just Ahmed Musa and Odion Ighalo as the only regulars for their respective clubs in the team. Successive coaches of the Super Eagles have found it difficult to discover creative players in the midfield who can step into the shoes of the likes of Oliseh, Finidi, Amunike and Okocha in the midfield area. What we have seen is a recycling of the usual names in the team. Whether this is as a result of fear of rocking the boat, one thing is clear; until we rediscover that creative spark, re-enacting our days of glory of the Super Eagles may just remain a niggling mirage.

 We no longer have midfielders that can spray good 20 to 25 yard passes into the opposition’s final third. What we see are midfielders doing the easy 5 yard and side ways passes. Much as one would not want to clamour for the Jay-Jay-esque master dibbling midfielder, fans love to see a midfielder who entertains and carves out openings for his strikers. With all due respect to the energy and industry of the Onazi’s and Mikel’s of this world, the job of a midfielder strictly goes beyond running the entire length and breadth of the pitch. The possession stats of the team should count for something in terms of creativity. Unfortunately, the likes of Victor Moses and Umar Aminu were particularly guilty of having too many lazy touches of the ball only to lose possession in vital areas. Mikel and Onazi have both developed into robust box to box midfielders in their respective careers and are therefore very similar in their roles. An attack savvy coach would play one and not both at the same time since they both offer energy and drive but very little guile, penetration and invention and so, if you crave creativity, you would have to play one at a time. Interestingly, both Oliseh and Siasia tried to address this issue. Oliseh had to drop Mikel for the return friendly against Swaziland. His reason was that he wasn’t moving the ball quickly enough. 

An unheralded Paul Onobi of Sunshine stars of Akure was drafted to do the job and we all saw the difference. Mikel is no longer the trequartister that holds the ball and carves opening for his strikers like he did in 2005 and therefore, playing him either as a deep lying playmaker or as an advanced central midfielder would depend on the opponents and the tactics of the team. He depends more on brawn than his brain in doing his job as a deep lying playmaker. Even as a deep lying play maker, one should be able to see some defence splitting passes forward to the likes of Ighalo to pounce. Andrea Pirlo, one of the finest midfielders of his generation transited from the trequartister that he is, to a deep lying playmaker for both Juventus and the Azzuris of Italy. while the likes of Marchisio and Pogba who still have the energy to run around seek to support the attack from the midfield in a more advanced role, Pirlo sits deep to spray those lovely passes that put opposing defenders in deep trouble. That is what the coaches want from the likes of Mikel but he simply lacks the guile, incision and vision to make such forward passes like Pirlo. The answer therefore is to seek another midfielder who can fill the creative void. Oliseh sought to address this by inviting the likes of Rabiu Ibrahim and Haruna Lukman. Siasia dropped Onazi to play Etebo who is a natural forward to play in the middle. Although he rewarded the coach with a goal in Kaduna, the gamble backfired terribly in the second leg. Surely, the local lads would have been given a chance to prove themselves in that department.

The Attack 

 Ighalo has endured some sort of mixed fortune for club and country. While he bangs in goals with reckless abandon for Watford FC, he keeps drawing blanks for the Super Eagles which is a serious indictment of creativity in the Eagles’ team. Apart from a goal scored in a world cup qualifier from the spot, Ighalo has endured a torrid time in front of goal. Iheanacho has grown from an attacking midfielder who stays at the pinnacle of a diamond midfield trio to a central striker. The statistics are graciously in his favour this season as the City striker with the most conversion rate in the team. This seems rather flattering when you have proven strikers like Sergio Aguero and Wilfried Bonny. 

We would all appreciate the improvement the kid has made in his career when we realize that the likes of Edin Dzeko were sold to pave way for him. So, how come we have one of the most potent strike force in Ighalo and Iheanacho and still fell goal shy? Nigeria managed just a shot on target against Egypt in Alexandria and won 0 corner kicks. Ighalo looked an isolated figure for the most part. Etebo scored in Kaduna off a rebound from an Iheanacho shot which rattled the upright before falling kindly to Etebo who just had to slot home into an empty net. Iwobi’s speed, Victor Moses’ pace and trickery, Iheanacho’s guile and industry and Ighalo’s prolific goal scoring form were enough to guarantee us at least a win at home. But unfortunately, the Eagles fell shy of the needed armoury to bite.

Defence

This department is without doubt the most suspect and culpable among all the departments in the team. But for the heroics of the goal keepers in goal for both legs; Carl Ikeme in the first leg, Daniel Akpeyi in the second leg, the Eagles would have been thoroughly embarrassed by the Egyptians. In the 2nd leg most especially, Nigeria would have conceded as much 2 goals in 7 minutes but somehow the goal keeper kept his shape and focus. Not so for the defence however as they kept making unforced errors in the defensive third especially the likes of Amuzie Stanley who had a torrid time with the pace of Salah. Siasia‘s decision to overlook the likes of Troost Ekong and Leon Balogun in his selection baffled many with the error-prone duo of Ambrose Efe and Godfrey Oboabona constantly on the edge

Tactics 

Siasia had the most pressure-free jobs any manager can dream of. He had a very short time to prepare the team and did his best under the circumstances. His knack for playing free-flowing attacking football showed in the game in Kaduna when the team enjoyed spells of possession and indeed controlled the game. Perhaps the saying that “a lone goal lead is never a lead” propelled him to keep pouring men forward without paying attention to the defence. This was even shown in the 80th minute introduction of Alex Iwobi whose major value was perhaps  getting a competitive cap for Nigeria to ward off interests from the likes of England which was already circling and no more. It was less than ten minutes to go. 

The prudent thing to do therefore was to close shop and see off the tie. Unfortunately, the pharaohs had other ideas. Questions would again be asked why the likes of Iheanacho whose energy and industry kept the Egyptians wary sat out the entire second leg. The team was a goal down and the last dice you throw as a coach is to bring in a defensive minded player in Azubuike Okechukwu?. The ineffective Ahmed Musa was also selected for the second leg after the shambolic display in the 1st. one would certainly excuse these obvious tactical gaffes because of the short notice of the job.

All in all, we would have to be content with watching the AFCON on our Tv sets without our darling Eagles. Unfortunately, we keep talking about going back to the drawing board without a thought in the world about long term targets and goals. The emphasis is always on winning the next game