Constant abuse and undue criticism of Odion Ighalo and his family members forced the Shanghai Shenhua forward to retire from international football, the player has reiterated, Completesports.com reports.
Ighalo followed in the footsteps of John Mikel Obi by calling time on his Super Eagles commitment on Friday.
Ighalo first considered quitting the national team in the aftermath of the Super Eagles’ group stage exit from the 2018 FIFA World Cup in Russia, but was prevailed on by head coach Gernot Rohr to have a change of mind.
The former Watford striker was hugely criticised by majority of the fans who were not happy he squandered two goal scoring chances in the Super Eagles 2-1 defeat to La Albiceleste of Argentina which cost the side a place in the Second Round.
However, the forward silenced his critics by emerging the top scorer in the qualifiers for the 2019 Africa Cup of Nations in Egypt with seven goals ahead of Burundi’s Fiston Abdou-Razak.
His most memorable moment of the qualifier came on matchday-three against the Mediterranean Knights of Libya where he scored a hat-trick.
Things started well for the talented striker in Egypt when he scored the winning goal for Nigeria with a sublime finish after coming in as a substitute in the Group B opener against the Swallows of Burundi.
The critics found their voice again after two barren spells against Guinea and Madagascar but he answer them with two fine strikes in the second round win against defending champions Cameroon.
Ighalo scored two more goals in the competition against Algeria and Tunisia and is in now line to win the AFCON top scorer award as he currently sit at the top of the log with five goals.
After the Super Eagles Third-Place match against Tunisia on Wednesday, Ighalo Completesports.com learnt, told Rohr about his decision to quit the team and the German accepted his stance.
Ighalo promptly told the coach he could no longer cope with insults and abuse directed at him and his family.
He is now expected to now concentrate on his club career with Rohr having obliged to his request to retire from the team this time around.
By Adeboye Amosu in Cairo
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COMMENTS
“Constant abuse and undue criticism of Odion Ighalo and his family members ”
.
There is a huge difference between criticisms and hate. Some people are intrinsically frustrated in their daily lives and habour a lot of hate in their hearts and would look for any way to transfer this hatred to others with abuse and unwarranted criticisms.
When you call someone a Bastard…an idiot…useless…stupid, that is nothing like a crticism. That is abuse and pure hate. To involve his/her family is taking hate to an extreme. That is the lot of many evil people we have here on CSN.
Ighalo is useless…ighalo is not a striker…ighalo does not have any business in the SE…ighalo should not be a starter in the SE…Ighalo is a fool….ighalo is this…ighalo is that….
What a way to show them the middle finger……even CSN acknowledged it with this
“The critics found their voice again after two barren spells against Guinea and Madagascar but he answer them with two fine strikes in the second round win against defending champions Cameroon. Ighalo scored two more goals in the competition against Algeria and Tunisia and is in now line to win the AFCON top scorer award as he currently sit at the top of the log with five goals.”
I am so happy for Ighalo for choosing such a right time to retire from the SE….16 goals in 33 matches (0.5 goals per game striker). You wont find so many strikers like that. 12 goals in 12 matches in the last year…..Top scorer in qaulifying…top scorer in the main tournament. Unarguably the deadliest striker on the African Continent at the moment. That’s the person evil people (they know themselves) on this forum pulled down and trashed.
Many fans from other African countries fear him so much…that boy Ighalo…but a prophet is never acknowledged in his home. Thank you very much Odion…you have done well for you country and history will never forget you. You are one of the few Nigerian strikers who scored at least one hatrick, won afcon top scorer award and had 0.5 gpg scoring ratio during their time in the SE. History will never forget you to be the deadliest striker in africa at some point in time.
Evil people have succeeded in frustrating yet another international to retirement….same way they frustrated the likes of Emmenike, Enyeama, Oliseh and Finidi into retirement. These are people who have never kicked an orange on target before in their whole lives…ask them to point to anything tangible they have achieved in their lives and they will scramble to find any. God pass all of them..!
Wish you all the best Ighalo. Thanks for the wonderful moments….the goals against libya (3rd goal) and Burundi will live long in my memories
Dr. Drey, you said my mind.
I fear Nigerians especially those who see no good in other. It point to the main reason why we are where we are. I am not proud to be a Nigerian when I consider the way we treat our own.
Ighalo is a legend and also an icon. I see reasons my some people will never think of playing for Nigeria.
I wonder where the coach will start from again.
Well said mr@dr drey but i like the decision of mr ighalo,so people like @pascal and his so called friends will leave him alone with their rubish comments,
Hahaha!Awon Science Student.
Hey the fool called @pascal had an oppotunity to borrow mb today congrats,tnx to glo,b/c yesterday was black thursday to him,animal
Ubah you are a laughing stock on this forum if you don’t know. I have better things to do rather than arguing with a jobless poverty stricken imbecile with brain problem. Lmao farewell
@pascal Ah i forgot that u have to follow ur ashawo mother to her costomer’s hotel,God punish you idiot
Yeah @pascal i forgot that u are following ur ashawo mother to her hotel,b/c dat is the only work an idiot like u can do.God Punish u animal
Drey nor mind dem…evil & perpetual underachieving suckas who knows nothing but ‘pull him down’
Abegi!
So we can now see that these unnecessary critisism and Insults does to our stars. Constructive criticism can be tolorated but insults, abuses to the players and his family is uncalled for. Ighalo revealed how he could not stand the insult his wife and children were receiving from Nigerians because of his world cup performance. And he wife pleaded with him to retire from international duties but with the help of coach Rohr he continued playing.
But this attitude should stop, we know that the passion is sports allows us to get emotional and criticize regularly these players but can’t we respect them at least, by not calling them names or insulting them. Yesterday it is Moses, today it is Ighalo, Rohr, Musa and we end up loosing our best legs. You cannot like every player but if you cannot encourage them then let them be. And we know that in life no body performs optimally every time. We all have our bad days but we never understand and continue to rain insults at these our players.
Now he is out, I hope we will learn from this.
Congrats Odion Jude Ighalo for your short but very impactfull time with the National team.
You have proved that your 30+ goals with Watform in EPL in a calendar year was not a fluke.
You have also proved that playing in China or any other obscure league does not reduce you and make you inferior to any other striker.
You have also proven that another body can bounce back after a bad season if you keep working hard.
You have also proven that you one of the best if not the best goal poacher in Africa. (leading goal scorer both in qualifiers and in Afcon proper, who would have predicted that, with the likes of Salah, Mane, Mahrez in contention).
Welldone for putting smiles in our faces. Wish you a glorious career ahead.
Madam must have prevailed on him! The power of a woman. I remember her giving it back to some abusive and ill-trained Twitter users who were tongue lashing her and her hubby for the Argentina match miss. Her hubby was mute but she tackled the hate speeches back to back.
Rohr persuaded Ighalo, but madam must have put her feet down now. What gives! They’ve got retirement money aplenty! I remember same with Enyeama retiringly prematurely after Oliseh pulled his own stunt and SE hasn’t fully recovered from the goalkeeping crisis since then. How about Emenike that followed suit. I wonder the kind of bashing someone like Akpeyi must be receiving on Twitter – except he’s wise enough not to have an account there. My advice to the next Number 9, stay off social media. Not good for your health. If you must, use a fake or proxy account. Thank me later.
I swear you no lie….lol…. Staying off it is the best because Nigerians no get chill o, they just want human being to become God and be so perfect meanwhile most of them are underachievers in their respective lives o.Awon were
The unconfirmed reports of the early retirement of Super Eagles deadly striker Odion Ighalo has again brought into sharp focus the impact of constant, persistent and sometimes brutal criticisms of footballers all over the globe.
The great Lionel Messi said after the 2018 World Cup in Russia: no more. With the his nation expecting him to emulate greats like Pele and Maradona in winning something for his country, the magician has so far failed to do so which has attracted constant criticisms from fans despite all he has achieved in club football (even his arch-rival Ronaldo has won the European Championship with Portugal).
Messi stayed on but yet again failed to win the recently concluded Copa America with Argentina, even getting sent off in the 3rd place play-offs!
Footballers have always been criticised. In times gone by, this was mainly done in the media (print, television and radio ). At least, if a footballer stays away from watching tv, listening to radio or reading magazines/newspapers, they might be shielded away from criticisms that occur beyond the field of play.
But now we have the internet; we have SOCIAL MEDIA in addition to conventional media, so, there is nowhere for these footballers to hide.
Imagine if Yekini played his football these day – oh my goodness! – him and his family will never see peace for the miss against Italy in extra time of 1994 World Cup quarter final match. Imagine Rufai was playing today, social media would be awash of his shambolic overall display in 1998 World Cup.
Times have changed and footballers have to orientate themselves mentally with the times. They need to build resilience against the sort of language that will inevitably come their way.
All I (a mere fan) do sometimes is express my views on this platform and some people come out hurling insults at me.
I don’t think footballers should necessarily retire because of the nature of criticisms they get – foolish, unpolished, misguided, illiterate and irrational people will never cease from the Land (and in social media, these nonentities have found their voice).
We can appraise, we can criticise, we can even condemn but we should never resort to abuse and foul language: it is just not fair.
Ighalo is gone, Emenike went for the exact same reason, my question is: who is next?
In fact to all the Haters please stay off the back of MY GOLDEN BOY KELECHI IHEANACHO…otherwise amadioho will strike b4 u even think of abusing or any of our players henceforth…
Stupid assholes
#CriticismNotAbuses
@ deo!!! You have my respect!!
For the record, you can’t find me abusing a player, no matter how much I dislike him. I am clearly not in support of such an uncultured behaviour. However, one of the greatest minds in this forum has said it all!
Nothing to add
You are too kind – thanks.
No need to read through, I’m sure he left cuz of so called Human beings like @Omo9ja,Iszy,Olayinka, and followers. I pray we don’t regret this move by Ighalo cuz he left when he’s at his peak for the Super Eagles
In fact to all the Haters please stay off the back of MY GOLDEN BOY KELECHI IHEANACHO…otherwise amadioho will strike b4 u even think of abusing Him or any of our players henceforth…
Stupid assholes
#CriticismNotAbuses
People like idiot@pascal.
Young man stop making a mockery of yourself by using abusive comments here even though people are ignoring but you still continue.
I felt so sad for the young man, sometimes we just have to appreciate them that they honour national calls, yes it is acceptable to criticize a player performance but taking it far to insult extent, that is not good. Just imagine he is your brother or your family member. Lets think before we talk or act sometimes.
Unfortunately, this is quite common amongst fans even on this forum and a lot are guilty of it.. I feel it all boils down to upbringing and the kinds of environment these uncouth guys grew up in..once this is a part of you you will even do it colleagues at work and even friends as well..u can criticize but when it turns to attack its a no no for me…All the best to Ighalo he has given much to Nigeria as much as Nigeria has also given to him by providing him a platform to exhibit his Talents when a lot never got the chance to do it…He has in turn done well to the best of his ability and when the national team of Nigeria is talked about Ighalo’s name will be one of the bright spotlights..Merci Jude Odion Ighalo
Forget Sentuments, not nice Cursing Players. In as much he called it a day with the National team doesn’t mean we should all be carried away, how can a player be non existence in a match for better part of a match and then slot in a goal when he felt like. Musa is another player that doesnt do enough with his pace too, if he wants to go he can, we need players that will play for 90mins and not players that thinks Super Eagles matches are like going on holidays from thier respective clubs.
Thank u Odion Ighalo the best Striker in African world as of today thank you so much for your great work,humility,elderliness and courage.
We NIGERIANS love you Bro
Offcourse such abusive criticism should stop because it brings about developing atitude to our upcoming once which will not be healthy to our environment and the game itself.
Sorry point of correction it bring about bad atitude to our upcoming once
What is going on here? For Ighalo to to quit the national team is normal. We are appreciate him.
Even, Messi, Ronaldo, Di Maria and so on have bn criticized before him which is normal. We wanted more of him.
Was he the best for the position? Absolutely no.
We have the best strikers in Nigeria and outside the Country but the people in charge of our football are letting us down most of the time.
What do we talking about? Ighalo the best for Nigeria? Come on now. The coach doesn’t up to the task and we are going to see the results sooner or later.
I like Ighalo but he wasn’t the kind of striker Nigeria can rely on. Out of ten chances, he can only score 1 or two. We saw that against Argentina. We saw that against Algeria when he would have given Musa the ball to score but as usual, his selfishness letting the team down again
Most of us here are very emotional which is normal. As a human being, we are unpredictable.
However, our wingers can’t Cross ball and that is why Onuachu couldn’t play much in the Afcon. The coach said he doesn’t bothered about that and he won bronze, for him it was like he won gold medal because that was his first medalist in football.
All in all, Ighalo wasn’t the type of striker Nigeria needs but our coaches were lazy and doesn’t care, that was why the team couldn’t scored more goals in Egypt because of our wingers and the type of coach we had.
However, coach Rohr is limiting the love I have for this game and I’m pretty sure that we are going to witness the same thing as time goes on.
Bye bye to Nigeria football.
Until we do something differently but if not, hopefully we won’t be the formal African football giant in Africa.
The truth is bitter. We should stop deceiving ourselves. We have what it takes to rule in Africa but we doesn’t have the coach and good leadership that can given us what we required. We have more than Ighalo in Nigeria. Ighalo wasn’t our best striker. It is a pity that our people we never produced strikers like Rasidi Yekini, Aghahowa, Kayode and so on. Hmmmm, black people. It is well. God bless Nigeria!!!
What is going on here? For Ighalo to quit the national team is normal. We appreciate him.
Even, Messi, Ronaldo, Di Maria and so on have bn criticized before him which is normal. We wanted more of him.
Was he the best for the position? Absolutely no.
We have the best strikers in Nigeria and outside the Country but the people in charge of our football are letting us down most of the time.
What do we talking about? Ighalo the best for Nigeria? Come on now. The coach doesn’t up to the task and we are going to see the results sooner or later.
I like Ighalo but he wasn’t the kind of striker Nigeria can rely on. Out of ten chances, he can only score 1 or two. We saw that against Argentina. We saw that against Algeria when he would have given Musa the ball to score but as usual, his selfishness letting the team down again
Most of us here are very emotional which is normal. As a human being, we are unpredictable.
However, our wingers can’t Cross ball and that is why Onuachu couldn’t play much in the Afcon. The coach said he doesn’t bothered about that and he won bronze, for him it was like he won gold medal because that was his first medalist in football.
All in all, Ighalo wasn’t the type of striker Nigeria needs but our coaches were lazy and doesn’t care, that was why the team couldn’t scored more goals in Egypt because of our wingers and the type of coach we had.
However, coach Rohr is limiting the love I have for this game and I’m pretty sure that we are going to witness the same thing as time goes on.
Bye bye to Nigeria football.
Until we do something differently but if not, hopefully we won’t be the formal African football giant in Africa.
The truth is bitter. We should stop deceiving ourselves. We have what it takes to rule in Africa but we doesn’t have the coach and good leadership that can given us what we required. We have more than Ighalo in Nigeria. Ighalo wasn’t our best striker. It is a pity that our people we never produced strikers like Rasidi Yekini, Aghahowa, Kayode and so on. Hmmmm, black people. It is well. God bless Nigeria!!!
I feel sad that ighalo is leaving at this time. it’s unfortunate. I see all social media forums and even the conventional media as a market place where everyone, including the sane and insane minds converge to express themselves. we also see haters in politics and other sphers of life. but do politicians resign when they are criticised? ighalo has every right to quit but I’m looking at this move from a wrong perspective because it may set a wrong precedence for the younger players to quit over criticisms from Nigerians in due course. Ighalo should have been patient for now and consider the feelings of his fans who have been patient with him, who love and encourage him rather than the haters. the implication of this retirement is that if ighalo wins the golden boot award then we would have lost an experienced player who has played in the world cup and in the nations cup and his absence would instill more confidence rather than fear in our opponents especially in african football. It’s not too late. Ighalo can still return. I love his resilience and encouragement he gives to his team mates and I hope some ex-internationals could talk to him and maybe so nff board members or other friends or govt officials. But if he wishes to maintain his stand, I wish him the best in his career.
I really love this forum because many people here give comments with insight. The arguments on both sides of the “factions” are valid a lot of times. The major prize lem had always been the kind of negative approach some of is employ in presenting our arguments. Perspectives will ALWAYS be different from from one person to another.
That being said, we need to be careful about our choice of words. Not just when we are talking about players, but also, while responding to others’ posts.
There will ALWAYS be reasons to differ in opinions about a player or about one another but we do not need to descend low and engage in use of very negative or abusive words. For emphasis again. I’m not just talking about how some of us rain abuses on players but how they even rain abuses on others. And people doing this are included in both camps (Rohr camp and anti Rohr camp), The factions we have created subtly in the forum. Creation of factions is inevitable when opinions differ but let’s just not make the factions permanent. Let’s move forward together as a house. I am begging you guys. Let is choose our words responsibly.
Sometimes too many vulgar and very abusive languages make the forum repelling. I hope those who are perpetually displaying this negative gestures will have a change of heart. Please guys, I am begging you guys, don’t let us destroy this beautiful forum with this kind of extremely negative attitude.
Ha! This is too much oh. Nigeria is a great country, if one retired another one takes over. Bugatti, Pinnic are highly condemned bcoz of their style of leadership. Nigerian! No correction and amendment without criticism. A good product must witness criticism. Super Eagles is an apex of players career. You must merit such height. But if you get there by crook learn to grow and develop through criticism. The National team gives Nigerians joy more than club football,bcos it foster unity amongst all factors in our locality. No one can hold Nigeria ransom for being lambasted. Constructive criticism is good but not for average Nigerians. We need protest and riot before heeding to change. This country can win World Cup if….. Select the right coach,players in this country not abroad oh.
Congratulations to Ighalo. The so-called useless striker gives his critics and predators two middle fingers. You are the best striker in Africa so far. Congrats Ighagoaaaaal. You pass them.
There is a world of difference between criticism and abuse and threats. Cheap data and free social media have given people without filter a voice. people that don’t need to see how their unguarded words affect others.
The abuse of players, the threats to their families is uncalled for. I can only liken the relationship between our players and coach with a cross section of Nigerian fans as the same as being in an abusive marriage. one day the abused will have enough and walk, even if prematurely for their own peace of mind.
Ighalo has answered his critics. Even without service from his attacking players, he has eneded up scoring almost 60% of all the goals scored by Nigeria in the competition (5 out of 9 plus one assist). he has ended up top scorer in the entire Africa, in a tournament that included Mane of Senegal, Mahrez of Algeria, Salah of Egypt etc.
he is a proven goal scorer and now he is at peace to play with a smile on his face. He could have carried on and taken us to greater heights, but because many do not know the difference between criticism and abuse, he has decided it is not worth it.
Igaĺlo is sendin a dummy.
Yakubu shold be invited to play for eagle probably he will redeem himself. Just like ighaĺo.I m sure it not possible. So ighaĺo shud thank God in his heart .
Ighalo, I wish you could have remained till 2022 World Cup! I wish you could have a change of mind and come back to the team! Your experience is needed for this young team!
I only wish him well and the team too!