Drowning Eagles, Keshi and the NFF.

   Bad pitch; the most notorious reason presented by apologists as to why the reigning African champions,the Super Eagles of Nigeria lost to Sudan on Saturday in the ongoing AFCON qualifiers. Since Nigeria won the 2013 edition of the African Cup of Nations, football in the country have taken a dip. Both on club and national team levels. Nigerian club sides have disappeared from mainstream continental championships and the Super Eagles have drowned. Pure and simple. Like Nigeria's Jay Jay Okocha rightly opined, football is dead in Nigeria. The game against Sudan was just a mere confirmation of this fact. After the AFCON victory, we went ahead to represent Africa at the Confeds in Brazil last year and had a decent outing, regrouped for the AFCON 2014 qualifiers and it has been disaster after disaster.
   Congo came to Calabar and tore us apart. They didn't just win, they outplayed and out muscled us. We went to South Africa and played out a draw. The loss to Sudan is a clear picture of the state of football in the country. Now to the details. The goal keeping set up of the Super Eagles is an interesting one. Enyeama is in my humble opinion, the best goalkeeper in Africa, and one of the best in the world. He is the only Super Eagles player that is worthy of a fans uprising to keep him in the team. Austin Ejide is an able deputy for him. Chigozie Agbim? The former Warri Wolves and Enugu Rangers shot stopper fall below what we expect in the Super Eagles. If indeed the third goalkeeper must come from the local league then we should be talking about Enyimba's Femi Thomas. I am an ardent follower of the Nigerian football league so I know. He has been very consistent between the sticks. So one wonders why Femi Thomas sits at home while Agbim remains Enyeama's second assistant. Our midfield in Sudan was a bunch of headless chickens. Stringing passes amongst themselves seemed a heavy task. Disjointed,to say the least. Our defence line went to sleep and the result was the Sudanese goal. Nigerians were left bitter.
   One school of thought blame the players. Others blame Keshi. The rest blame NFF. These people all have a part of the blame. The players played as if there was nothing at stake. I feel that was a rub off from Keshi. It's true that no coach sets out to loose a match. But it's equally true that players will in most cases exhibit the attitude the coach has,towards a game. A manager's seriousness translates to his players. Eg. Sir Alex Ferguson, Jose Mourinho, Carlos Dunga etc. I dare say that the players weren't serious because Keshi himself didn't show a high level of seriousness too.
I wonder why exactly Keshi entered into the banter with his former striker,Ikechukwu Uche. I don't think it was necessary. An elder shouldn't be seen publicly bantering with a 'kid'. As it stands now, the player refuted all Keshi's claims. So who is right? Player or manager? The banter didn't do the image of the Eagles Supremo and the team itself well. It beats me why Keshi have blatantly refused to invite Kelechi Iheanacho to the Super Eagles. The case for him is not that he comes to take over from Mikel Obi, but that at least he becomes part of the team. Who knows, some minutes under his belt could show us what he can really do. He showed us a glimpse of what he can do in his pre season games with his club Manchester City. Even if he doesn't get match time, training with the more experienced players in the squad will help him learn the ropes.
   Amaju Pinnick is the new NFF Chairman. He is not new in football administration,having led the Delta state wing for a while. He should therefore know that he is carrying the hope of millions of Nigerians on his shoulders. NFF have always been deemed to be corrupt. He can change that notion. Since I was born, and now I am getting older I have neither seen, heard nor even imagined the NFF distanced from corruption. Fact is Nigerian football is dead. It didn't die after a brief illness. It died after a prolonged illness. And illness it was born with. And a death aided by corruption. The glass house have become an epitome of corruption. Most recently part of the glass house was gutted by fire. An incident that will need the intervention of my great grandmother to convince me it was an accident and not man made. Pinnick need to discard what has been, and get his own drawing board, map out how exactly he will run the Glass House. I remember how my northern brother, a mai ruwa, hugged me passionately (no homo) in one of our Beijing Olympic football match. Before I could say Jack Robinson he flew into my outstretched and celebrating arms. That is how we love football in Nigeria. That is how football unifies Nigeria. Something Amaju Pinnick should note.
   Our Eagles are no longer super. They are drowned. But we can get it right again. Even if Keshi is sacked like some people want,who takes over? The Keshi of today is not the Keshi of yesterday. Something went wrong. And it sipped into our football generally. I don't know what it is. But we need to find out. Because if we don't, even a post Keshi era won't be beautiful. Our dead football should be resurrected. And please, we should do so before the same people who killed it come out with the burial plans.