Prince Isidore Odua has been in the Nigerian football scene for decades. He was a former member of the Nigeria Football Association(now Federation) and former Vice Chairman of Anambra State Football Association. He has worked in various committees, including the defunct Local Organising Committee for the 1995 FIFA U-20 World Cup, which eventually, Nigeria did not host. In this interview with Jacob Ajom, the experienced administrator bares his mind on the Super Eagles and Coach Stephen Keshi. Excerpts
What, in your opinion, caused the Super Eagles failure to qualify for the 2015 Africa Cup of Nations?
The problem with Nigerian football is that nobody cares to look at the workings of the Technical Committee of the Nigeria Football Federation. The committee is supposed to know which part of the team needed to be strengthened or if the entire team needed total overhauling. The technical committee’s duties are enormous. It is not a place for people who are not sound in the technicalities of the game. They should be held responsible, not Jonathan, as some people are insinuating.
Apart from the incompetence of the technical committee, the other major reason for the team’s failure was indiscipline. The coach and his players lacked discipline. The national team demands people who are committed, people who are patriotic and are ready to die for the nation. But from what we saw of this Super Eagles, they lacked all these traits.
Having failed to qualify for he 2015 Afcon, the focus would shift to the 2018 World Cup qualifiers. Should Keshi be retained for that task?
Just as it is said, ‘you don’t change a winning team’, in this context, it can also be said, you don’t retain a losing side. Keshi’s time is gone. Anyone talking about Keshi now is wasting his time. I am advising Keshi to take a walk because if I were in his shoes, I would walk away.
There is this theory that Keshi who won the 2013 Afcon trophy in South Africa was sabotaged. You share that belief?
I don’t believe in the theory of sabotage. The players he used were not disciplined. They played for Keshi and not for Nigeria. There are very many good players out there. Why did he not call them? The team that played Italy 2-2 before the World Cup was good. He should have retained that team instead of experimenting with new faces every time …up to the World Cup, Keshi was still experimenting.
In our days, late NFA Chairman, Sunday Dankoro would ask his coaches, can I see your winning formula. That was when Dan Anyiam and Father Tiko were in charge of the national team and J. K. Tandoh was head of the technical Committee. Now all people talk about is money…money and money. That is why the technical committee cannot operate.
Now, what is the way forward?
We have to get a very disciplined coach and a functional technical committee. We have to start afresh.
From where should NFF go for the next coach. Foreign or local coach?
A very good question. For now, Nigerian coaches have shown that they are not capable of handling the national team. They have lost credibility. We have to get a foreign coach. If they insist on a local coach, then there must be a foreigner to supervise him. I have no trust in our local coaches again. More @ http://www.vanguardngr.com/2014/11/keshi-take-walk-prince-odua/
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