Nigeria now face a stern test in a bid to make it to the 2020 African Nations Championship after the home-based Super Eagles suffered an agonising 4-1 defeat to Togo in the first leg of their final qualifying round fixture at the Stade de Kegue on Sunday evening, reports Completesports.com.
The Home Eagles started the game brightly and took the lead in the 10th minute through Ibrahim Sunusi.
The home team equalised in the 16th minute through Richard Nane.
Nane doubled the Hawks advantage in the 67th minute following a long period of pressure.
Tchakei Marouf scored the third goal from the spot in the 75th minute, while Agoro Ashraf got the fourth deep into stoppage time
The Home Eagles, who reached the 2018 CHAN final in Morocco, will now need to win the return leg in Nigeria next month by at least three unreplied goals to go through to Cameroon 2020.
Home Eagles Starting Line-up
Theophilus Afelokhai – Ebube Duru, John Lazarus, Olisa Ndah, Dennis Nya – Fatai Gbadamosi, Ndifreke Effiong, Samuel Matthias – Mfon Udoh (captain), Sikiru Alimi, Sunusi Ibrahim
By Adeboye Amosu
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COMMENTS
The coach is incompetent and should be sacked immediately as he has no business coaching the team for the return leg. He does not know what it takes to produce a good team. He thought teams are assembled only by name. Did he test his team against quality opposition to know their weakness? He feels he would just put a team together without testing it and then walk over Togo because they are unknown quantity in African football? Gone are those days. The Nigeria Football Federation has a blame in this anyway. Our national league is not up to scratch. It is run like an amateur league. Even amateur league is better. There is no define calendar for the league. League matches are played only when it is convenient for the NFF and league management team. No wonder our teams have been underperforming on the continent in the past 5 years. What a shame? A country of over 180 million teeming population cannot produce exceptional football talents. All our national team players come from abroad because we don’t have good football organization at home. We can not boast of good coaches. I think a lot need to be done to put our football back on track. God help Nigeria.
“Did he test his team against quality opposition to know their weakness?”….pls sir…against which quality opposition…??? Against clubs that have been out of season for almost 4 months or against other national teams….??? And who should arrange the quality test matches…the coach or the FA….???
Or were you in Mars when the team was only called to camp by the FA just over a week ago and they were even still debating if it is their returnee bribe taking Salisu that should coach the team or Imama Amakpakabo…?
Those who fail to plan only plan to fail.
Let us wait till after the 2nd leg before we start crucifying the coach. At least he has shown twice before now that he has the ability to galvanize his team to massive comebacks. Let hope he will be 3 times lucky this time around. If he can pull this out, I will forever respect him.
It’s just unfortunate that our administrators always wait till wen we are boxed into these kinds of situation before they wake up from their slumber and start doing what is right.
We Nigerians always think others will lay down and be runnedover just because we are Nigeria…the lie lie giants of Africa. The Togolese have been in camp long ago preparing for the qualifiers…they have a functional league and matchfit players, they had played 2 qualifiers already and even went as far as going to get tapes of our team to study them.
Nigerians don’t wanna work hard but want to win…..after all who be Togo…we are NIGERIA we are giants of Africa…we can just gather players, even if they are on holidays and go and beat anybody in their backyards…LMAO.
My broda this thing pass the coach o. Haba na, our league has not even resumed while others have been going for a couple of months now. Which miracle are you expecting the coach to perform under such circumstances? The blame falls squarely on our football administrators!
You mean to tell me that after all these years of us running a so called professional league that we still haven’t figured it out. The thing is too painful to even think about
I disagree with you my people. It’s not about our league but there’s a lot of things surrounding this result.
Our league have bn like that for so long still, Nigeria produced, Rashidi Yękini, Okocha, Mutiu Adepoju, Kanu and so on.
However, I see things differently. They way our league is today, we can produce a solid and sound team but the dictators in the “NFF board are the main problem of our sports”.
They will not allow the coach to select the best team to represent our Country.
Coach Dennerby for example. He refused to join the bad people. He, coach Dennerby cherished his image a lot that was why he left the country.
Same thing is happening to coach Rohr. He has no choice, that is why he took Akpeyi to the world cup and Afcon.
There’s a lesson here my people to be learned. No matter what, know your value and let your employer know that you are capable of what you are doing. Don’t sell yourself because of money because money is not everything.
So therefore, we still have qualities in our league. The dictators are playing politics with our football.
There’s a lot to put in place before our league can be one of the best in Africa and in the world.
NFF will continue getting it wrong until our ex players taking over from them.
Our league doesn’t have a structure.
Our league administrators do not have ideas on how to run the league properly.
By allowing our ex players in every corner of our sports, I’m pretty sure by God’s grace, Nigeria will have the best league in Africa.
For now, our ex politicians must be kicking out of our sports. Then, our ex players will finish the job less than ten years. This will provides good facilities in Nigeria for our local players to benefit from.
Please stop blaming our league. We still have a long way to go because of the bad people in the Nigeria Football Federation caucus. Ire o. God bless Nigeria!!!
You can produce a solid and sound team with players that cannot even pass trials in Esperance, Al-ahly, or Mamelodi Sundowns….LOLz.
Where are your Agege and Ajegunle boys that you said are better than our Main Super Eagles…??? Didn’t you discover anyone of them for the CHAN team….??? Lolz.
Call Afelokhai call Afelokhai, Afelokhai don chop 4 from Togo hand….lolz.
It is the same you who said we shouldn’t blame our league, it is the same you that is still say our league lacks structure and administrators are lacking ideas on how to run it…..yet we shouldn’t blame our league…LMAO.
@drey, u just got me rolling on the floor. You’ve seen that this guy has really got a very biiig problem. He was jumping all over the place like a crazy monkey clamouring for afelokhai and the rest of them, now him don chop four against Togo and he’s become dumb like an idiot. Lol
LMAO…..when their favored players flop, they heap the blame on the coach….Lolz. Oversabi people dem.
Imagine they even blame coach rohr for Esiti’s flop against ukraine. The same Esiti they were boasting they discovered for Rohr. They said Rohr should hav changed tactics when the match was 2-1 and added a defensive midfielder to help defend the lead….but Rohr did tat even while the lead was safer at 2-0 bringing on their Esiti their discovery only for him to be limping all over the field and surrender the engine room to the ukrainians, yet, it was the coach they heaped the blame on, while for Aribo, they credited themselves for “discovering” him for the coach simply because the dude had a stellar outing….as if we’ve not all here been seeing aribo perform his magic at Rangers thus earning rave views from Stevie G. Lolz .
Now their superman goalkeeper that needs to be in the SE for us to stop conceeded goals shipped in 4 against Togolese home-based and they have been looking for whom to blame again….LMAO
Lol..odiegwu o
@Dr. Drey, Lolz. Ahhhhhh, this is so funny o lolz.
No comment. Sometimes, it’s good to be quiet. Agba o nsoro bi ewe.
Ride on, it’s your time. Use it well. God bless Nigeria!!!
People Open your eyes!!!!
Though I’ve never being a fan favorite of Coach Imama cuz I feel he’s not fully up there as a Coach that can handle this. A Coach that has never won an away match with the team! A coach that always depends on Foreign based stars to come use there individual brilliance to bail him out at home and then we’ll all applaud him for a job that was not done by him. Now, foreign based stars cannot come and bail him out at home! Let’s see how he will go about it. Even if we qualify for the tournament which will be played AWAY not hosted in Nigeria, I wonder if he will be able to savage even a point.
Stop pointing fingers at the Football league administrators!! Open your eyes people!! Our league has always been like that for years yet we win qualifying matches Home and Away! So what’s the fuse about the League quality about?? Take a look at the Depth in that squad! That tells you that the Problem is they lack confirm Manager. Until we see and admit the real problem, we will be kicked out of the qualifying stage like Play. Same goes with the Olympics qualifying tournament in Egypt, I fear for Nigeria! Imama is not yet the man.
The last time I checked, the teams that lost to Libya and Sudan away from home where majorly foreign based…the likes of Awoniyi, Odeh, Azubuike, Nwakali, Orji Okoronkwo, Kingsley Micheal,Olabiran etc all played in those away matches . The biggest problem has always been enough time to train and gel together….not the person of Imama. The fact that they always come back home and massively turn the results around after spending days training together says a lot about the challenge of the team.
If you hate Imama for not inviting your player tell us point blank rather than coming here to blackmail him with white lies.
Tell us one CHAN qualifier that our home based eagles ever won away from home….tell us just one. Even a draw we struggle to get away from home. Go and check the records and stop letting your hatred becloud your senses.
As disappointing as this result is, one can hardly blame the players or the coach. Players with 3 months of inactivity will naturally lack match fitness no matter the drills the receive in the National camp for a couple of weeks. Some of these players played their last matches since June, while for those whose club did not qualify for the Super-6, it’s even longer.
The same situation has resulted in the poor performance of our teams in the continental competitions.
The blame lies squarely on the organisation of the league. What does it take to align our league with the rest of the continent so that our players and teams will have a number of matches behind them before the commencement of continental competitions, and WAFU and CHAN competitions. We can’t keep on operating the same wrong system and then look for scapegoats to blame.
From the reports of the game, the team started brightly, fizzled out towards then end of the first half, and then collapsed totally in the second half. Is it not obvious that the players were not match fit? Getting players into the right physical conditioning takes more than a few weeks in camp and a couple of qualifying matches spread over weeks. The daily training rigours of the clubs and the week in week out (sometimes, twice weekly) matches of the league are the only ways to get the players fully fit for match situations. That is why, even the main international competitions like World Cup and AFCON are scheduled not too far away from the end of the regular league seasons of the top leagues, so players go into these championships practically carrying their league form with them.
The earlier we fix the problem with our local league calendar, the better for every aspect of our football development.
This is most sensible post I’ve seen on CSN for weeks now.
Oga mi really you spoke like someone who knows football. My mind is telling me right now that you must have played some football at a point in your life. May you walk and never stumble sir.
Nigerians really love living in a fool’s paradise. 180million people my foot….as if population plays football. Some is asking why the coach didn’t “arrange” test matches for the team….Abeg is it team coaches that now arranges friendly matches for the National team…? Even at that against what teams…? Against league teams that have been inactive for months…? When did the FA call these players to camp…? Just about a week ago.
Our arrogance in Nigeria makes us think we will assemble players that have been “idle” since June and go and beat the Togolese national team comprising of players from a functional league, that have camped for several months and played 2 competitive qualifiers already in this qualifying series.
If the fact that our league teams struggle to scale through the preliminary rounds of CAF competitions is not enough indication of how crappy we are, the fact that our players leave the league go to play in Zambian, Sudanese, Ethiopian,Vietnamese,Iranian or Iraqi leagues should be a testament of the low quality our league possesses.
Yet some longa throats will be clamouring for players from the same league to be called up by Rohr….LMAO. they will be citing the example of Stephen keshi. Those who have good memories know how long keshi camped local based players and played close to 7 international friendlies with them before they could be at least good enough for the main eagles bench. I still recalled at least 4 of such friendlies with catalunya, Seria leone, Egypt, Liberia. Prior to then,we couldn’t even qualify for chan on our first 2 attempts, being knocked out by the likes of Niger and Benin. We only managed to qualify after many series of closed camping, international friendlies, 8 bench warmers at 2013 afcon (save for the one season wonder- Sunday MBA), another 6 bench warmers at the confederations cup in Brazil (with the league top scorer Gambo Mohammed freezing in front of Victor Valdez). Keshi did a whole lot of work and wasted lots of resources just to get a few who could at least make the eagles bench back then. The most successful of them all couldn’t rise beyond playing for lowly Rizespor in Turkish league. The likes of Sunday Mba ended in French 3rd division, Gabriel Rueben, Eguekwe, Paul Onobi etc all ended in Finish league. Those wey supposed to be the best of them all. Our last chan players could go beyond signing for relegation battling teams in Libya, Morroco and Algeria.
Yet our arrogance make us think we can just assemble players in 2 weeks and go and steamroll other teams in their home ground as if they are there to sell guguru and take selfies with our players.
Some fat lairs are claiming the league as been like this. Thats a lie from the pit of hell. The league that produced the likes of Kanu, Amunike, Amokachi et all used to be far better that this one. The league had sponsors, good officiating, good coaching and scouting networks, and had a great fan appeal….from onikan waterfront to lekan salami stadium, from ogbe stadium to Ogba to Dan anyiam to ‘the cathedral’ in Enugu where Holy holy rangers used to do their thing….down to the legendary sharks stadium….not forgetting the Maiduguri slaughter slab of elkanemi, the pillars stadium, jos township and Kaduna township stadia were teams like plateau utd and ranchers bees were Lords….. everywhere you go you see fully packed stadia. Go to National stadium 4hrs to kickoff on FA cup final days and you will have to pass through the main gutters to get into the stadium because the gates are already jampacked, only to get into the main bowl and find 100,000 fans already seated. Players were not owed salaries and the league had defined calendar. Our teams on annual basis will at least get to the semifinals of any of CAF cup, Tessema cup or Sekou toure cup. So anyone that claims the league then and now are the same is a bold faced lieing agbaya. The league now is a huge crap. Even ifeanyi udeze always laments same on his diary which I follow regularly online that there’s been no improvement, rather it’s retrogression as many of the problems in the league since when he left Nigeria in 1997 and more are still present till date.
Like I’ve always maintained we need to do a serious reality check on ourselves and stop living in the glory of old. Before the ukraine friendly I was seeing claims like we should will beat them 0-3….ukraine is not our mate….this and that. A few days ago one clown was referencing our victory against Brazil at U23 level almost 25 years ago as the reason why we should defeat them in the next friendly….I’ve even heard people say talent wise we are on the same level as BRAZIL…….LMAO. Other statements like AFCON trophy is our birthright and we are good enough to play in the semifinals of the World cup are some of the laughable comments that make my day on this forum.
Nigerians wake up…….!!!! Stop day dreaming and overrating yourselves. There is a reason why one country is ranked no 1 in the world and we are ranked no 34….and it’s not because what they did 25 or 50 years ago. Lol
Nowadays, if you don’t work harder than you opponent (on and off the pitch) you will be humiliated.
Dr Drey, you speak sooo much truth but we continue to live in an illusion. I just don’t know why we refused to face reality.
Thank you so much ,Sir. I always emphasized my favorite quote “Stay Woke”.Anything positives we get in football is a privilege and not our birthright
Like i said in one of my post here on csn, Nigeria is curse on every level of administration with bad leadership. May the good Lord have mercy on we Nigerians.
My bro@tola I understand you but this one is not leadership wahala,this is the fault of those shameless so called players
Hahaha lolx i don laugh tire,so this shameless old lazy men started the game with with 12 men according to Mr editor,maybe that is why they scored first because i know that dey can’t score a goal,yeye footballer’s they only know how to post on pictures,
I think Imama needs to be sent on refresher courses to upgrade this knowledge. He is yet to get a point away from home, With foreign based players, he lost all away matches and had to rely on home advantage to qualify.
Since the last decade, our league has always been like this and we have never been disgraced in this manner.
Let’s call a spade by his name, Imama needs to upgrade his coaching skills.
Imama is not learning anything. After understuding Rohr for almost 3 year he is still not getting it. He has lost all is away games with big margin. He shd be sack with immediate effect.
Pay and play in action as usual.What are the qualifications of this Imama guy before he got this job, what are the criteria’s used in selecting these players. This are legitimate questions we should be asking. Accepting failures or regression as the new norms should be rejected by all sane minds in Nigeria, then a again most Nigerians are insane anyway due to serious abuse and oppression from their useless administrators.Stephen Keshi RIP, reached the Chan finals with same local players, Siaone won Africa Olympic qualification championship with same local players, it’s obvious something is seriously wrong with this coach or the players selection process. Sugarcoating or justifying this stupid result just to prove a point is part of the nonsense happening in Nigeria everyday. Same attitude that led some fools to accept a jihadist as their president.Get a better local coach, better scouting with good preparations I think they can do well.
Hmmm……Oga pay and play…..please bring forward whatever evidences you have that these players slected in the CHAN team actually paid to play. Is it the same Afhelokai that ingrates have demonized Rohr for not inviting to the SE that paid to play, or Ibrahim Sunusi and Mfon Udoh (both top scorers in the just concluded season), or Ebube Duru and John Lazarus who won the league with Lobi last season, or Ndifreke Effiong (who has been superb for the U23s) or Dennis Nya ( a superb leftback who won the U17 wc alongside iheancho in 2013)…..??? Please tell us which of these players paid to play.
When we say the hatred some people were born with is obstructing their thinking faculties, they think we are just insulting them, rather stating a clear fact.
What better credentials does a team of coaches need to manage their homebased national team, other than being the league winning coaches of 3 season ago (Imama), 2 seasons ago (kenedy boboye) and runner up in both seasons (fidelis ilechukwu).
Students of history will recall that Stephen keshi spent almost 2 years grooming homebased players, with multiple training camps, international friendlies numbering not less than 7 (that I can remember), with the few good ones being called up to join the big boys in the main eagles and also observe from the bench in major international tournaments AFCON and Confed Cup, before we could manage to ‘QUALIFY’ for our first CHAN in 3rd attempts. Siasia also had weeks leading to months of camping with the U23s leading up to the U23 AFCON in Algeria in 2015, having initially started with mostly foreign based players in his team. Every sane man will understand that these factors are very important in a team sport like soccer.
But its obvious some senseless people were in Jupiter and so didn’t read on the net when our ever complacent FA released the list of invitees to this CHAN team a little over a week ago and were still debating whether it should be the hitherto suspended bribe taking finalist the last time out to coach the team or the U23s Imama Amakpakabo.
It is only imbeciles I know that compare apples to Coconuts, butterflies to eagles and a spark to an atomic explosion.
Pls what was Stephen Keshi’s credentials before he was given the U20 team to handle in 2001, what was Samson siasia’s credentials when he was appointed to be keshi’s assistant…? Did their failure in 2001 stop them from becoming achievers later in future…..??? Every coach deserves time on his job…to fail and to succeed. It is only imama’s away losses they remember, they never remember the fact that he also somehow managed to overturn those losses in spectacular fashion in the return legs. For heavens sake the man hasn’t even spent 1 month on the job.
It’s the same people who will insult the Rohr, insult Manu Garba, Insult Aigbogun, Insult Imama, insult amodu, insult keshi, insult eguavoen, insult Obuh as if a coach is meant to be a magician and start waving his magic days after mounting the saddle. The same keshi they sing his praises now in dead, they maligned while he was alive. They always know more than the coaches but will never apply for the job to go and single handedly right all the wrongs they claim to have solutions to.
Of course it is Togo…..we can always defeat them even by calling up players who are holidaying a week to the qualifying match. It is Nigeria’s birthright to win matches even when our hosts have prepared longer and better than us. That’s what deluded people call winning mentality and not settling for mediocrity.
Some people are not even ashamed to come and say our league has perennially been in tatters. Is that a good thing….??? that decades will pass by and our league will be getting worse and worse by the day.
If not for keshi who had that foresight of camping the home based team for months and extending invites to the few good ones amongst them to train with the bigger boys and gain confidence and exposure, we probably would still be struggling to qualify for CHAN by now. Damn we couldn’t even qualify for the first 2 editions and are yet to win any chan qualifiers away from home in almost 10 years.
All these only show the poor quality of our league and its products. I make bold to say that there is no difference in quality of players from Nigerian league and players from Niger, Chad, Benin, Sudan and others apart from the big 5 leagues in Africa. Even our club sides struggle to get even a draw when they play away on the continent. The last times we had quality teams from our league was the days of Enyimba, Rangers and Julius Berger circa 2002-2004 when these teams will beat teams 2, 3, 4 goals to nil home or away. They had players that didn’t need quota system to make the national team….the likes of Ejiogu, Sam Okoye, Junior Osagie, Late Endurance Idahor, Ameachi Nwanze, Ishola Shuaibu, Sunday Rotimi, Nwaneri, late Romania Orjinta and many others.
Now our teams get beaten by even 2nd division clubs from Serria Leone and Burkina Faso and can’t even win convincingly at home. only 2 out of 4 representatives manage to scale through the preliminary stages of club competitions.
Its even worse now that we run abridged league and don’t even have a date for the commencement of the new season. So I wonder what miracles we were expecting. We scored first against Togo and gased out in the 2nd half shipping 3 goals in the last 20 mins (an indication we didn’t have enough competitive match fitness).
We have always relied on home advantage in all our chan qualifiers from its inception….and this time isn’t an exception. Our league players are simply not wired to win away from home. its part of the dysfunctionalities of our league.
@dr drey that is why i like ur posts u always get it right,that shameless man called imams or whatever has brought shame to Nigerians,now he opened his dirty mouth to talk about young and inexperienced team,after collecting bribe frm his fellow shameless old fools,
Dr Drey, you nailed it. I think the problem is from those who run the league, not the coach or the players; these are good players, it just that they are not fit enough to compete due to time to blend together and the manner our league is being run.
I don’t think most of us are surprised by the fact we lost,even if it is Togo! When was the last time any of our home based side got any result away,best is a draw.
I think the shock is in the way we lost,it was a heavy lost.yes even if we lose,we were expecting a slim loss,but 4! That’s the shocker!
And that shock brings out the rage.
We all know the reasons that lead to our loss and our perpetual failings as an home based side,be it club or country.
The administrators are terrible.
The truth is,the FA has always focus on the cash cow which is the super eagles;for obvious reasons. money!
The falcons,under 20s,u-17 and all under junior teams only get focus on when competitions get nigh. Simply because there aren’t much money to gain from these set.so the corrupt dogs always stay away and put them on the sidelines.
The club sides that should sidelines be part and parcel of the league don’t even run themselves. If the state governments that owns these clubs don’t release money,they go down under.the Nigeria league is at the mercy of the state governors.
What sponsors really want to put money in a league infested by rodents,who can’t even keep their house clean!
Then we have coaches that are stuck with the “only home win” mentality,because they know they got a bias referee and their raging home fans to back them up if things don’t go well on the field of play.
With all these,what kind of breed of home players do we expect to represent us internationally?
We got players demoralise,with the wrong psychology,badly coached,and players with no drive.
The only thing keeping these players going is their loyalty to their country;and the fact that they know,doing well internationally is an opportunity to get to better place than where they presently are.
And with that,my problem with this boys arise.
Yes.we have blamed the FA,the administrators and the coaches.
Yes.there was no planning.and it was the normal firebrigade approach.
But come on! There are times you need to play for yourself and show you quality. You were the best in the league in a country of Nigeria status,you should know what’s expected.
Yes.you already know the situation back home is terrible, but you are playing for you now.
Imagine you have beating Togo,what you would have gain?
That should be enough motivation to do the needful;
Yes. The season hasn’t started yet,but most of you are drawn from enyimba,kano pillars,rangers,lobi stars etc.
You have played intercontinental already,and there are obvious pre season going on everywhere around the country.
The boys let themselves down,and the country too.
What’s done is done.
The solution; no matter how much we scream on here,i don’t see any changes coming soon as it relates to the league management.
Shehu Dikko is more focus in signing deals for the super Eagles,rather than aligning The league with such sponsors. The league management board is more focus on the super eagles rather than their own league.
It is pathetic.
Well,they would beat Togo in Nigeria,but by which scoreline..
Sad, we have gotten to this stage..
Mr hush, thanks for sane reasonings as usual, the coach is now blaming the defeat on his young and inexperienced players. Why did he took brooms to gun fight in the first place.from Aigbogun to imama these jokers are just the reflection of that country.
Coach of the Nigeria U23 and CHAN Eagles team Imama Amapakabo has taken a swipe at players playing in the Nigeria Professional Football League (NPFL) after his team 1-4 loss away to Togo in the CHAN Qualifiers.
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Imama watched from the bench as his team fail to build on the early goal they scored in the team to lose 1-4 and the coach has now suggested that the players found it hard to interpret or understand his tactics and formation.
In an interview monitored by Owngoalnigeria.com on Brila FM, the former Enugu Rangers coach said the problem goes beyond the players as most coaches in the NPFL also don’t know how to apply tactics and formations in games.
‘It is a difficult thing for Nigerian players; based in the Country, to interpret tactics and formation, with due respect even some of the Coaches in the league don’t understand tactics and formation, so how do you give what you don’t have,’ he told Brila FM in an interview.
The coach who also doubles as the assistant coach of the Super Eagles is however confident that his ward can overturn the 1-4 result suffered in the first leg in the second leg tie in Nigeria next month.