By Nelson Dafe on March 30, 2016

An inquest into how the England Football Association failed to keep hold of Alex Iwobi from slipping off their grasp to represent the country of his father has begun. Alex Iwobi, who has been in impressive form lately for English Premiership top side Arsenal, ended any speculations about which country’s jersey he would be donning at the senior level on Friday when he turned out for the Super Eagles of Nigeria as a substitute in an African Nations Cup qualifier against the Pharaohs of Egypt in Kaduna. Now the English media as well as England fans are ruing their loss of this very promising youngster.

Daniel Taylor of UK’s Guardian newspaper writes that Iwobi has been allowed to slip away without any serious fight from the English FA.

“The fact remains, however, that Iwobi was in the England system and the relevant people – through carelessness, poor judgment or not being proactive enough, call it what you will – might come to regret what has happened when there is clearly the potential for him to be an international player for many years,” Taylor says.

Iwobi’s coach at Arsenal, Arsene Wenger, weighed in on the matter during the weekend and practically accused the English FA of negligence in not following up with earlier invitations of Iwobi for English duties.

Iwobi represented England seven times at under-16 level, thrice at under-17 and once at under-18 level. He was said to have been well-embedded in the English youth set-up but all of a sudden the invitations stopped.

“He played for the England youth teams for a while but when it came to the under-19s, they didn’t pick him,” Wenger said, reflecting Arsenal’s puzzle at the apparent lack of effort to make Iwobi feel wanted by England.

The English FA though has stressed that Iwobi was simply more sentimentally attached to Nigeria where his uncle Austin Jay Jay Okocha belongs to the county’s football royalty.

Taylor counters this notion by writing: “It certainly wasn’t a snap judgment on the teenager’s part to look elsewhere given his last appearance for England came at under-18 level in October 2013 and it was almost two years later that he grew tired of waiting, registered with Nigeria and made his first couple of appearances in non-binding friendlies.”

He further warned that England might come to regret its seeming carelessness or poor judgement given that Iwobi has the potential of becoming an international player for many years.

Meanwhile, comments from England’s fans in reaction to Taylor’s article in The Guardian have been mixed with some hitting at the English FA while others expressed more caution in hyping Iwobi.

A reader who self-identifies as SirNatty said: “Why would anyone ever want to play for the rubbish English team and make one or 2 caps (looking at you Wilf Zaha) or 10 caps that get stripped off (ahem A. Johnson).

“Plus Nigeria pay bonuses upwards of 3000 GBp for each game unlike the cheap FA that only offer 1500 for a win.”

Another reader counters: “What if England just have superior – or at least comparable – players to Iwobi? I remember similar stories when Victor Moses decided to play for Nigeria and nobody is really regretting that one now.”

One other reader, ElDavid offers a more middle ground opinion: “Some players in Iwobi’s situation will choose a country for sentimental/personal reasons, some will choose for strategic/career reasons. Some will have that choice essentially made for them by the FAs in question. Club and national managers will all have their own interests in mind, as will the player. Personally I don’t see anything wrong with any of that.”

•Photo shows Alex Iwobi.

Source Daily Sports

Posted March 30, 2016

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