Sunday Oliseh, who has been in charge of the Nigerian Senior Football team, Super Eagles, for five months has expressed his satisfaction with the team.
Since Oliseh took over, the Super Eagles have played eight games, with four wins, three draws and one loss.
Within that period, the team only conceded two goals and scored nine.
In a recent article published on Sunday Oliseh’s website, www.sundayoliseh.tv , the former Dortmund midfielder gave an account for his time spent with the team so far.
“Coaching Nigeria, though challenging, gives one so much joy when one feels as we do, the joy it brings to over 170 million people,” Oliseh said.
Two days after starting as chief coach of the Super Eagles of Nigeria a representative of a major sport website came up to me in Abuja to make me an offer: “Give us privileged access and information to the Super Eagles and in return we will write only positive things about you and the team”.
As you would expect, I declined the offer and today that website has been christened “the anti-Sunday Oliseh’s Super Eagles Website”. Others have made similar offers and some even worse….
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I have been in charge of the Super Eagles for five months. So far we have played eight games, won four, recorded three away draws and suffered one defeat. We have only conceded two goals in one match (against the third best African nation, DR Congo) while we have scored nine goals with a relatively new set of players.The average Nigerian is ecstatic about the results, but those who seek and represent special interests, beg to disagree.
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Coaching Nigeria, though challenging, gives one so much joy when one feels as we do, the joy it brings to over 170 million people. There seems to be a renewed interest in the national team.
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One would think prior to taking charge of the Super Eagles (as those we refused privileged access try to portray) Nigeria were winning every game and playing champagne football.
The truth is the total opposite though as we only recorded one victory in five games, including a home defeat to Uganda, and were absent from the 2015 Afcon.
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The Nigerian Football Federation, under this new administration is actually (to my knowledge) bent on trying to bring about positive change to the county’s football which fortunately falls in line with our philosophy.
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Moses Simon, Sylvester Igboun, Chima Akas, Paul Onobie, Shehu Abdullahi, Carl Ikeme, Odion Ighalo and Austin Obaroakpo among others are new players that now star for the Super Eagles. That were not the case in the recent past and it is refreshing to see and be part of their team build-up.
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I am quite optimistic about the progression of the Super Eagles and just as we welcome the applause that have been showered on the team by the fans, we also welcome constructive criticisms towards the team that simultaneously offer suggestions at how it could be done better.
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Many can tell you what they think is wrong with you, but very few can effectively tell and show you how to do it better! 2008 ushered in a new era in world football: that of a team oriented success over individual stars.
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That explains why we rarely see heavy scorelines anymore as was the case in the past due to the fact that even if a team lacks individual, highly talented stars to win, they build their competitiveness around collective schemes and though in the end they might crumble to better talented teams they will not be ridiculed.
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Nigeria have no choice in my opinion; we need to build a talented, hungry and patriotic team to serve our 170 million compatriots.
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This post was last modified on November 30, 2018 1:40 pm