By Dally Sports on January 29, 2019

Super Eagles Technical Adviser Gernot Rohr has once again weighed in on the Victor Moses and his possible return to the Super Eagles debate and he has given a forthrightly firm opinion on it.

The Franco-German has firmly stated that Moses would need to show desire to play for Nigeria again and that he must prove better than the players currently playing in his stead in the Super Eagles.

Since Moses announced his retirement from the super Eagles after last year’s Russia 2018 World Cup, there has been a clamor from a large section of Super Eagles fans for Moses to rescind his decision and make a comeback.

The NFF Chairman Pinick Amaju has been making subtle moves to get Moses to return or at least agree to a testimonial game to bring his time with the Eagles to a more graceful end.

Such has been the influence of Moses on the Eagles over the years that people continue to wish to see him play on for the national team.

Which Nigerian supporter could easily forget the marauding runs of Moses at the 2013 African Cup of Nations in South Africa where the 26-year-old winger was a thorn in the flesh of opponents as he played a starring role in helping the country win the tournament?

And there have been many other matches for Nigeria in which Moses had looked undropable as a result of his fantastic form.

When he announced his retirement after the World Cup, it came as a surprise. At such a relatively young age, many players of course do not quit international football. What must have been the cause? Could it have been a decision taken out of the huge disappointment of failing to go beyond the first round at the Mundial? Could it have been because of despair about the system in Nigerian football occasion by the considerable disarray that engulfs Nigerian football sometimes? Or could it have been because of something more personal to the player?

Whatever it was, the decision had been made and Moses had opted to concentrate on his club career at Chelsea, leaving fans of Nigerian national team football feeling a certain sense of loss.

However, with the new Chelsea manager Mauricio Sarri hardly giving Moses a look in, as he mostly confined the Nigerian winger to the bench or out completely of his match day squad this season, and with the speedy star hanging to go to Fernabace of Turkey to revive his dwindling career, Nigeria has since moved on. The Eagles have a slew of new and very exciting promising players coming through and easily negotiated a tricky qualifying route to the upcoming AFCON scheduled for Egypt later this year, after a wobbled performance at home to South Africa in a 0-2 home loss in the very first qualifying match.

While the national team has been steadily growing and transforming into a more forceful group, Moses has seen a reversal in his professional fortunes.

But many live to look back and pine for that which has been good. Moses has been good for the national team and the general feeling is that the more good players there are to fight for shirts, the better it would be for the growth if the Super Eagles.

Asked about the possibility of Moses coming back to the national team fold, Rohr, who has earned the respect of vast majority of Nigerians because of his undoubted coaching abilities and the intelligence and dignity he has brought to the job, painted a rosy picture of the national team without Moses, with the emergence of players who have helped the Eagles to evolve well post-Russia 2018. Here’s his statement on the Moses issue:

“If he (Moses) wants to come back, it’s an advantage to the team only if he can attain the standard he puts up in the last installment with the team. He must show a lot of motivation, he must show that he is fit to play for the team because we have other players playing well in his position now.

“Moses has to be strong to come back to the team because we have more options on the wings now like Samuel Kalu, Samuel Chukwueze, Alex Iwobi and Ahmed Musa. All these players are very good on his wings, he remarked.”

As common sense as this response it, it is good to have it reaffirmed in a country where sentiments about rosy past can color badly the path toward a better future. Where an attachment towards a player can be a burden that prevents the emergence of other players into the international fold.

Now that Moses has gone to Turkey to begin a new journey, it is hoped he can truly revive his professional career. Nigerians generally wish him well. He had it in him to bounce back to the very top and if he does so and decides on a return to the Eagles, then it would be a beautiful story. If not, Nigerians and Rohr have seen of the present to harbor excitement about the future of the Super Eagles.

Source Daily Sports

Posted January 29, 2019

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