Flamingos coach Bankole Olowookere has expressed disappointment with the exit of Nigeria from the ongoing 2025 FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup.
Recall that the Flamingos were thrashed 4-0 by Italy in the round of 16 on Tuesday night.
Reacting after the game, Olowookere told FIFA.com that it was a painful defeat but that the experience gained so far at the tournament will help shape the future of his players.
Read Also: 2025 U-17 WWC: Italy Thrash Flamingos 4-0 In Round Of 16 Clash
“Honestly, it’s quite a painful. We came into the game with mindset of doing something special, making sure that we win and we progress to the next stage.
“Unfortunately, we held the game for 44 minutes before the painful goal came in and it was all squandered on the second half. It’s one of those things.
“The players gained a lot of experience. Going to the World Cup, having met many other nations, many other players and all together, those experiences go a long way to help their career, to make them superstars in the future.”
13 Comments
Quota system, selfishness, greed!!! you just gather Yoruba girls from your village, wear them Nigeria color, and send them to meet those who have prepared 2/3 years ahead
You want to tell me that considering our performance previous years and what we have done so far this is all we can give to the world?
It was the same stupid response that the U-20 coach gave after dismal performance in Chile
This is how you people play with our emotions without considering how much wound you are inflicting on us, Satan will judge you all
You want to tell me that a sound coach will come with this result? Eg, you want to tell me that if Coach Samson Siasia was the one who took U-20 team to Chile we will not get to final?
Until those in charge learn to do the right thing…THE WORST BECONS
Maaaaad people everywhere!!!E NO GO BETTER FOR NFF FOR CHOOSING COACH AND PLAYERS ON SENTIMENT
You realized the coach picked the girls from his region/tribe simply bcos you are tribalistic urself because if you aren’t, you won’t be reading meaning to names but performance, the ladies are Nigerians and they represent the country same as the coach.
Femi, what Harrison said is true, if a coach is from Easter Nigeria, he or she will select many players from that region, it has been going on for a while now; plus, NFF officials will impose players on the team and those that qualified will be dropped. Our teams will be struggling on the continent and world stage if not properly addressed.
With the tournament taking place yesterday, one is left to wonder what happened to the bulk of last year’s Flamingos team who were very impressive in the group stages, a team that won the FIFA Fair Play award in that tournament.
This year’s Flamingos did not possess a single exceptional player. Okay, Moshood and Terlumun down the flanks were mildly impressive, but that was it.
I thought the 4:0 scoreline flattered Italy because the match was way more competitive than that.
Bankole’s girls put pressure on the Italian defence whenever the Europeans were attempting to play it out from the back. Sadly, very poor shooting technique meant Nigeria couldn’t fully capitalise on those chances.
Talking about technique, I thought this was the only difference between both sides yesterday. When the Italians had their chances at goal, superior technique meant their shots found the target, 4 times.
Nigeria equally created 4 credible chances to score, but they squandered these with efforts lacking in precision.
When it comes to actual game play, in truth, there wasn’t a lot to differentiate both sides. Italy were impressive with their clever interplay of intricate passes which opened up Nigeria, but which Nigeria equally repelled with tight markings, credible interceptions and neat clearances.
Nigeria, on their part, pressured the Italians off the ball in the final third and used long balls and quick passing routines to get under the skin of the Italians.
But, as mentioned, the Flamingos failed miserably to capitalise of the chances they managed to create due to their lacking in intelligence, technique and composure needed to convert opportunities into goals.
But I enjoyed the match, yes I did. The Flamingos were focused, professional and determined which came across in how often they contained the Italians and how often they came agonisingly close to scoring.
But, you can give what you don’t have. Flair, quality, staying-power, versatility, dynamism, pitch IQ, this team lacked.
And it showed.
Like Aliyu Zubairu like Olowookere, may handlers of Nigerian national teams learn from their mistakes in terms of selection, early preparation, technical know-how by the gaffers and ultimately NFF.
Moshood impressive? You mean the one-trick pony? I beg to disagree on that one.
All she does is shoot with her left, even if it’s in the center circle or she has a better-placed team mate in the 18-yard box. Very poor coaching input.
Everytime the ball gets to her, shoot with your left. There are 4 defenders in the 18 box, maybe try to pass or work your way??? For where!!?? I’ve got to always try my luck by always shooting. It may hit the defenders or sail over the bar. It doesn’t matter. I’ll still shoot with my 5% chance of scoring. It worked in Africa, so it may still work at the World Cup against teams with superior technical coaching and tactics. Lol.
Which early preparations? The u17 team took part in the national sports festival in Abeokuta, the went to Ghana (i think) for u17 wafu cup and also play through the qualifying rounds all within a year. Once the quality for the world cup proper, some of the girls that helped in the qualifying series like Hamony, Animashaun were yanked off and there places taken.
What should be asked is why were those girls replaced? Have they been moved to to u20? If yes then that is good as u17 is developmental, but if no, then as we have all been suspecting , u17 girls have now been hijacked by corrupt agents and nff officials.
Just like u20, they wait for qualification before the dirty deals
How are they gathering players and how are they selecting coach for our underage team.
Failure of today will affect us in years to come by not having players to transit to national team.
Wike, taaa. We will soon begin to beg foreign born players to come and rescue our cadet teams even though we have not done any convincing for anyone since Waldrum left the Falcons.
How can a local coach with terrible coaching at these levels interprete formations for foreign born pros sef who will feel stifled by the lack of basic modern techniques of the coaches?
The road ahead is rough because the disaster glass house I know will ride and die with local coaches that will see no potentials in their player power play yet still pick them to continue this shit show failure of 2025 into the coming years.
Very soon, we might begin to have foreign coaches for our younger teams. We are getting there because those ones, credit to them, will have nothing to lose, but help us unearth incredible gems.
Many nations coming to WAFCON next year are coming with foreign coaches who understand different tactics.
Madugu (he’s not the first local coach to win a WAFCON trophy so I still don’t trust him) unfortunately will rely on player willpower to navigate situations like what we observed against Algeria and Botswana at the last competition as well as against Benin Republic – because “as it was in the beginning I learned about tactics, so shall it be tomorrow”.
Papafem wrote yesterday we have good players scattered around the world. I sincerely hope so because new queens are seriously rising but the sad truth is we are still joking there isn’t serious threat to our throne.
As it is now, the next set of flamingos can as well be more decrepit than yesterday’s own.
Gusau and co, the sole architects of this football slide, will not succeed in this haram forever.
Well said, @Wike. The team was weak, wasteful and worthless.
@ Wike, transition in national teams are very important especially for countries with football plan and philosophy. That’s why we have all these age grade teams. However, not all players will move up to the next level as a lot of things happen along the line, some football related and some not. Also late developed players join along the line.
But in our case, selection process have been corrupted by criminal agents who work hand in hand with some nff officials. That’s why you keep hearing of slots for home based players in SE for example.
These slots are for marketing, nothing more. Those crooks do not care the damage they are doing to the national teams, all they want in money.
There is a scouting department within nff which is non functioning, and the technical committee, the less we said the better.
A team that was speaking yoruba on the pitch. It shows that the coach did not scout round the country. He just used his yoruba kinsmen to fill up the team. The same way U20 coach used his hausa kinsmen to fill up the team. Amunike did it but was lucky it worked for him. Moreover these are old analog coaches that have been left behind by modern foorball. Hopefully they will audit NFF and find out what is going on there. Every NFF president that leaves office suddenly becomes very rich,same with our local coaches. The only coach in NFF is Chelle, others are mere rubbish contractors. The worst is yet to come from Nigeria football. Just watch and see.
Is the coach still going to be retained based on quota basis?
The way he sounded it’s like the girls went for sightseeing and excursion not to participate in a competition