The Nigeria Football Federation (NFF), desperate to hire a new coach for the Super Eagles, is this weekend mired in confusion following its inability to come to terms with former Olympic team coach, Samson Siasia. The Super Eagles have an African Nations Cup qualifying match on September 5.
The Nigeria Football Federation (NFF), desperate to hire a new coach for the Super Eagles, is this weekend mired in confusion following its inability to come to terms with former Olympic team coach, Samson Siasia. The Super Eagles have an African Nations Cup qualifying match on September 5.
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The most recent coach, Sweden’s Lars Lagerback, resigned after rendering a dismal record of zero wins, one draw and two losses at the last World Cup tournament. Ahead of the competition, he played two friendly matches, tying with Columbia in an empty stadium in England, and beating North Korea in South Africa. He earned $300,000 per month.
With an important match in three weeks and no substantive coach, the NFF woke up last week in crisis mode. The federation itself is on borrowed time as the current leadership is temporary and an election is due in seven days, on August 21, 2010.
On Wednesday, the NFF hurriedly invited Samson Siasia to a midnight meeting to offer him the job of coach for the Super Eagles, with the intention of having him prepare a team for the September 5 match, and a mandate to qualify the Super Eagles for the African Nations Cup!
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But the NFF claimed at the meeting it does not have money to pay Siasia’s salary. Indeed, one of the NFF negotiators asked Siasia to work for free! The federation claims that Globalcom "GLO" and the Presidential task Force "PTF" paid the last coach's salary.
After a tenuous back and forth, Saharareporters learnt, the federation relented on the slavery first offer and offered to pay Siasia 2 Million Naira ($13,333) per month, with no offer of a sign-on fee, accommodation or transportation.
In contrast, Lagerback got 45 Million Naira per month. Before him, Berti Vogts got 15 Million Naira ($100,000) per month. Yet none of the two foreign coaches performed as well with our national teams as Nigeria's indigenous coaches: Keshi, Eguavoen, Amodu and Siasia.
Siasia is arguably the most accomplished, foreign or indigenous, of these coaches, having won 2nd place in FIFA U20 Championship in 2005, and silver in the Beijing Olympics, among others. He has not lost a match to any African national team.
Deservedly, Siasia demanded to be compensated on the same scale as Berti Vogts. NFF negotiators countered with a warning: "if you (Siasia) want to coach the Super Eagles, you must drastically reduce your demands" when negotiations resume next week!
The most important jobs in any worthy football federation are the jobs of the coaches and then the players. All available funds are usually first spent on coaching and players. In Nigeria, the reverse is the case; the corruption-ridden NFF first spends mostly on perks and compensation for the NFF management, while asking the local coaches and the players to sacrifice for the good of the country. That usually means taking lower or no salary, paying their airfare, or playing matches without compensation.
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