By Daily Sports on April 2, 2018

The government of Buhari was again told the home truth last week when former Chief of Army Staff, Lt. General, TY Danjuma after x-raying the ills bedeviling the present day Nigeria, mischievously promoted by Muhammadu Buhari and his clowns of clappers gave his verdict as an elder statesman.  The verdict obviously did not go down well with Buhari’s men who have since taken up arms against TY and like men without honour their rankling still vibrates. But they are all empty. TY has passed the message he had for those who still does not know Buhari’s agenda. No patch- patch. His fellow bed mates have called TY names but what I’m waiting for Buhari and his evil men to declare all that TY said as treasonable or even declare him persona non grata if they are man enough.

Those of us from that side of the country that knows Buhari inside out cannot be caught unawares. TY just rehearsed the obvious and as a government made up of devils and blood tasty ritualists, nothing touches them.

However, no matter their blackmail, they will meet their doomsday at the polls come 2019 and it is only those that want to be fooled forever that will be deceived into believing what Lai Mohammed says. Once beaten, twice shy, they say. Buhari without doubt has offended the establishment that brought him to power and this is speaking against him. I digress.

This is World Cup year and countries that would be at the finals in Russia are planning, preparing and testing their strengths and weaknesses against their opponents in friendly games which will enable the coaches gather enough information in all the departments in their teams and then harness them for onward implementation as they progress in the game.

Nigeria’s Super Eagles team has been in the thick of action having played Poland and lately Serbia. The results of all the matches are already known and both countries have moved on. The essence is not necessarily the score line but how the boys played and whether the formation and tactics will fly or if they need a change.

These and more are the look outs and to be honest with you, any technical hand that knows his onions would readily tell you the above. But don’t get me wrong, I am not saying winning match(es) in a given friendly is not it, No! It serves as icing to the preparations and coaches most times are no so comfortable with such showing due to its far reaching implications on their teams and the players in competition proper. Sometimes it’s after effects have recorded negative on some teams.

It may be against such background that a mixture of results in friendly games are most preferred as it would not give a team false hope that it has arrived. It is why friendly matches are desirable for teams to test their might before going into serious championships like the World Cup. The loose end(s) discovered on the course of such exercise is being tackled head on before the summit proper.

That has been the way and manner modern day preparations are done and Nigeria can beat her chest to say it has joined the big league countries that show case their team to tough sides in order to have first information on its squad before it jets out to Russia 2018 World Cup tournament.   

If you read our last week article on how Nigeria fared against Poland and what it must do against Serbia you would come to terms with this page that it did a balanced job so far as the friendly matches as lined up for the Eagles are concerned. It is one thing at a time and after the games, the technical adviser Gernot Rohr will collect and collate the performances and then find an antidote of what he and his crew discovered and then move on to face her group’s opponent in one game after the other. He has been working hard to come thus far. The Franco- Germany technical hand has also maintained his cool to ensure he built a team that would stand the test of time in Russia global football summit starting with our first game on June 16, against Croatia.

He is still searching for a winning formula and formation that would stand the pressure of any tough opponent. He is one that talks appropriately. He has not hidden the fact that he has a relatively young team and that he is not promising the World Cup title but he believes that the boys being out-rightly hungry and dedicated will make sterling impact. He has good knowledge of the World Cup and also has good measure of confidence in his team. He knows that if there is no avoidable distraction, the Eagles would be concentrated and focused to do the business that brought them to Russia. He has said it to those that want to listen that the team’s qualification to the Mundial is not a fluke and so preparations, strategies, planning and all are in top gear to turn in a team to be reckoned with.

Rohr is not a coach that talks on drop of hat and his concentration has been on how to harness these individual talents that are in abundance in the Super Eagles to not only play as a team but also to be bold enough to take on any team that comes its way wholesale, a Nigerian side that would be no respecter of any team or big names, a Super Eagles squad that will play its game without being under any influence of intimidation or fear. A team that has total confidence in itself no matter what and what name(s) is in the lineup of the day’s opponent. That and many more have been his major thrust.

Nigeria has been in the World Cup from US 1994 and did well. The giant West African country since then has been searching for relevance which has refused to come by. That is our story. One will also concede that since our preparations for the World Cup, this year marks the most prepared if the kind of friendlies line up to assess and toughen the Eagles are anything to go by.

This NFF leadership has done that and many more. It long resolved the often dispute area between the players and the NFF by ironing out amicably what accrues to the players and strengthened how payment would be made. If that agreement holds water, one can say that something has been done concretely towards that direction.

Now on the Serbia / Nigeria friendly that took place in London last week Tuesday, many commentaries have been made for and against and the purpose of this write up is not to dispute any thereof. This column has maintained the highest form of professionalism which balancing has been its watchword.

The verdict is that the loss to Serbia is the best thing that has happened to the Eagles in this its stage of preparations. It is one loss that we should celebrate because of the anticipated sense of direction it will bring into the entire team at the end of the day. I saw Eagles side since Gernot Rohr took charge that were purposeless right from the referees blast of the whistle signaling   kick-off . I saw a team that all the players put every foot wrong and its fighting spirit deserted. I saw Eagles that have no urgency in its agenda.

Well, that may look like crying over spilled milk. Yes and no. However, Rohr and his crew made notes and only they would know what went wrong.

Fact is that the kind of seriousness with which Eagles went into Poland match was totally absent from what we saw last week Tuesday against Serbia. Their day’s opponent in London was no push over though not enough to overwhelm the Nigerians as we did see. If Eagles have put into that game half of their efforts against Poland, the story would have been different. But never to worry and that is why it is called friendly match. It is a window that gives team (s) second chance.

Both teams will go back to the drawing board and fish out their mistakes in that game and make amends preparatory to the final show down in Russia against their various group opponents and sundry later on in the tournament.

Heads or tail, I will also say that there is no cause for alarm. All that went wrong in the Serbia game would but put on the table and thrashed out in order for it not to repeat itself in future. Rohr is eagle eyed and with hard work from the players, they will pledge a reborn. My assessment is never the loss, if that happened and the team played well, it will be a different ball game, but this one the team lost 0-2 and did not fare better, double Walhalla you may say.

I also don’t agree with former Eagles goalkeeper Emmanuel Babayaro that we don’t really need a fantastic goalie to Russia. My candid submission here is that we do for obvious reasons. Every department of the team ought to be well fortified and at alert too to forestall any threat from any angle.

He knows better what to adjust while I am still at loss what to vividly pinpoint. He caught me pants down to say the very least. In his bid to justify his not too fantastic goalkeeper to Russia World Cup showpiece, Babayaro added that the hue and cry about goalkeeping department is because of the many chances the Nigerian team gives out to opponents in any match. I agreed intoto with him on the amount of open chances the Nigerian teams gives to its opponents to score her thereby exposing its goalkeepers to the mercy of these dare devil strikers.

The Atlanta 1996 goalkeeper was on point in that aspect as he harped on the urgent need for the coaches to ensure that concentrated attention and searchlight is beamed on ensuring other area are fully fortified in order to forestall opponents from easily penetrating into the vital areas of the Super Eagles when the team is under any kind of pressure. I don’t like singling out a player in any mistake in a football match because of it team sport nature but what the defenders did against Serbia left sourest taste in the mouth. The same way the first goal came was how the second was also scored, then you are tempted to ask what Troost Ekong was doing in that department of the team. It was something Rohr must critically look into as preparations for the tournament build-up.

Babayaro said the obvious if every department of the team would be ready to go no matter the fact that this set of World Cup Eagles cannot boast of super star player(s) it can hold its own in Russia no matter the level of its opponents. The team has zeal and good measure of self-confidence too but the players in their various ways must imbibe the attitude of total defence and marking closely opponents without passing back the ball to them and placing them in a close range which no goalkeeper no matter how agile would save.

I don’t support the way and manner Troost Ekong or generally our defenders go about their job on the field displaying loss of concentration. We saw how Ekong played against very slippery and Fulham danger man Mitrovic to score a brace in the same way and manner, a clear and typical case of an absent minded individual who learns nothing and forgets nothing.

Honestly, I’m not one who points accusing fingers on players and their mistakes during games but when it is like unbecoming of an individual you are tempted to do so. Our defence must be at red alert because of the computer like kind of strikers on the field now. This is not time to sleep defend. He was invited to the team to displace Kenneth Omeruo and Godfrey Obaobana the duo that man the heart of defence during AFCON 2013 and World Cup calmly soaking off Messi’s threat.

One must say without any prejudice that since the arrival of Leon Balogun and Troost Ekong, nothing more fantastic have been noticed, rather it has been retrogressing and it is not good for our World Cup where Nigerians expect some progress from the previous. Also enters one Abaziem all in the bid to get central defence problem solved but it has shown that the more you look, the less you see.

It was after such wobbly defence display that this column ran an article Central defence, Central problem during the early qualifiers to the Russia 2018 fiesta. Sadly, it has persisted despite Rohr’s efforts to nip it on the bud. The quality of defence in the present Super Eagles side has been nothing but terrible. Those that brought Toast William Ekong into the team and steadied him have seen his quality of football. He caused the two goals Eagles conceded against Serbia. The coach saw his shabby way of defending and told his boys to there.

It is good we lost the game this time instead of being in fools’ paradise at the end of the day. It is good so that those Eagles players that may be thinking that the team has come would sit up and redouble their efforts genuinely and put in their best in the game or give way. The era of playing casually is gone.  It is still my fervent belief that if Rohr gets his acts together and the player imbibe such and play same, Eagles will make stronger showing in Russia. What I don’t subscribe to is the fact that whenever the team won any game it struggled it does so. Win is win. Eagles game against the Polish national team was action packed and full of suspense. The Nigerian side meant business and proved a point too. We all saw their under-performance against Serbia from the word go and the result did not fail to come. The casual way it approached the match was glaring. There was no inspiring player. Their game like kind of play and display was absent. They were shadow of themselves, Period.

This column also aligned with former handler of the team and captain, Christian Chukwu who shared almost same opinion with us here on the Serbia encounter. He was a successful player and a coach. This is Chukwu’s stand, read on…

Christian Chukwu confident Super Eagles will do well in the world cup

Despite the Super Eagles uninspiring performance in their 0-2 loss to Serbia in Tuesday’s international friendly game played in England, former head coach of the Nigerian senior national team Christian Chukwu is confident that Nigeria will do well at the World Cup in Russia.

The Super Eagles had earlier struggled in their 1-0 win against Poland last week with Victor Moses scoring from a controversial second half penalty.

Chukwu however believes there’s no cause for too much concern arguing that the team has what it takes to fly high in Russia.

“I don’t think there’s need to press the panic button yet. Friendly matches are meant to prepare the team and work on the weaknesses. It is good we are noticing some of these things now as there is still enough chance to work on them. There is enough quality in the team to do well at the World Cup and I believe we will get it right,” Chukwu said.

On a final note, that Eagles will do well is all our prayer for the team. Our social media handles are active and open so let’s discuss more in any of the platforms as usual, while the searchlight for what would be the best for the team continues. Let keep shooting till next week!!

Source Daily Sports

Posted April 2, 2018

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