Amodu: Siasia’s Inexperienced For Eagles Job! Former Super Eagles Boss, Amodu Shaibu Blasts Embattle

Coach, Nigerian football scene has not  been the same since the Super Eagles failed to qualify for the 2012 African Cup of Nations. What are your thoughts on the current state of the game in the country?

I have said so many things before and after that Guinea game and I wouldn’t want to repeat myself. My reactions were everywhere in the print media, the internet as well as the broadcast media. Even Mitchel Obi read everything on his radio programme on Raypower. So, don’t let us go back to that again.

No doubt Nigerian  football is in crisis, at least going by the unimpressive showings of the different national teams in recent times as well as the clubs.What exactly do you think is the problem?

I have heard so many people talk about hiring a foreign coach, but I don’t think that will solve the issue because the problems bedeviling Nigerian football are  structural. If we don’t address it wholistically and continue with the normal fire brigade approach that we are fond  of, then, we will continue getting the same results.
We should  stop this cut and nail approach to things. Again we have to be very  patient as a nation if we want to get things right. We appear to always be in a haste to get results which is not helping us. Instead of addressing the issue wholistically, what we always think of is instant success.

Samson Siasia is just unfortunate. He is a victim of circumstance based on his inexperience. I have said this before, when you don’t  have a solid structure in place, then no matter who you bring in, you are bound to get the same results. If the game is properly managed  by experts, I mean the right people, then I believe the outcome  will be different.
There is nothing superb about all these successful European countries, just that they do the right things at the right time. They have the proper structures in place and get the best people to manage their football.

You mentioned Samson Siasia and said he is a victim of circumstance. Are you in any way absolving him from any blame?

The first thing I would like to say is that he is inexperienced for the job, he lacks the pedigree to handle the Super Eagles. When you talk about the national team job,  it is not a place to come and learn. It is a job for someone who is widely experienced and also possesses  cognitive experience and qualifications.

It is not just because a person played football to the highest level alone.You must be coming from a sound background where you have dealt with matured players and achieved good results too. Then you are qualified to manage a national team by Nigerian standards. We are well respected all over the world not only because of what we have achieved in the past, but because of the quality of players that we produce.

So when you  don’t have all these things  I mentioned and want to use the Nigeria national team to learn, make mistakes and correct them, in a country where everybody wants result, it is going to be difficult.

If you were to be in Samson Siasia’s  shoe, what decision would you have taken  after the team’s failure to qualify for the Nations Cup?

Many of us have worked with the national team before and got sacked.The national team is not a do or die for any coach. I have been there before, then  left and still came back on three occasions. Siasia can still come back tomorrow, he is making it look like a desperate thing for him, as if it is life and death.
My advice for a young man like him is for him to believe in himself. He should go and try somewhere else and make his name, they will call him back. It has happened before to some of us, so  why is he so desperate to hang on?

What about the other ex- internationals who have either shown interests in the job or been touted as replacements in the event that Siasia is sacked. Are you saying that each of them lacks the requisite experience?

Yes, they don’t have the experience. People must grow, though  I appreciate the fact that they all have ambitions and also have the potentials to be great coaches, but the fact that they have not managed such a situation anywhere that we can refer to, means that each of them has to be an understudy to someone else.
What you have in Nigeria is different from what you have in Europe. We can even get them to manage our domestic teams here to test  how competent they are. If they want to get Sunday Oliseh and the Administrators allow him to bring in experienced people to come and work with him like he has said, then, no problem.
If they don’t agree and insist that they want to go for a foreign coach even though most of us don’t support that,but it’s just that we can’t help the situation, then, goodluck to them.

But the Technical Committee of the Nigeria Football Federation  has already recommended hiring an expatriate.
Although I am not in support of that,  but, if they want to bring in a foreign coach  and they think that is what will give them results, no problem.  If the coach  succeeds then we all applaud him. There  is no problem with that. The people running our football are the decision makers. People outside can only make their suggestions or state their opinions on the issue at hand but it is not theirs to make the final decision.
Sunday Oliseh recently said he would be willing to work with you, if allowed to tinker the Super Eagles. Are you  open to such overtures from your former player.

I don’t think I need to react to that  because that is Oliseh’s position.As a coach you are free to think the way you like and also say what is in your mind. He has expressed his mind and that does not mean that is the situation on ground, but what he said is a good idea coming from a young man who is ambitious and knows what he is doing.He has the right to coach the national team just like every other Nigerian.So, fine, that is  his position for now.

I cannot react to that  for now, because I don’t know the thinking of the people at the NFF. No matter what you write or say, the final decision still rests with them.

The two expatriates who did well during their respective reign in charge of the Super Eagles, Clemens Westerhof and Bonfrere Jo, have also come out to categorically say that the job is bigger than any indigenous coach in Nigeria….

What did Bonfrere achieve here before he left? We all know what happened before he was sacked back then in 2001. The Super Eagles were at the point of missing out of the 2002 World Cup in Japan and South Korea before myself , Stephen Keshi and Joe Erico salvaged the situation.

So, I don’t know what he is talking about. You need to ask him what he has achieved since he left Nigeria, absolutely nothing. I just blame the people who give them publicity because it is when they are looking for jobs that you will hear  them say different things.

They made names for themselves in this country,  but have nothing to show since they left.Several times he ( Bonfrere) has tried to come back here but the ghost of his last performance still follows him around.
As for Westerhof, we all know how loud-mouthed he is. He was given the task to manage the Kwara State Football Academy and he flopped. Since he left as Super Eagles coach, he has not really achieved anything too. If he failed  with an Academy here in Nigeria, he does not have any right to say we don’t have competent coaches around here.
We went to the last World Cup with an expatriate who we paid a huge sum of money but we still could not achieve anything. The most important  thing is to provide the enabling environment for the local coaches here to succeed.

Coach,we have seen you manage the Super Eagles  thrice in the past. If the opportunity comes again, would you still take it,  based on your experiences with soccer authorities in the country?

The Nigerian authorities believe that I am anti-establishment, maybe because of my vocal nature. Half of the sportswriters in Nigeria don’t like me because of what I say, what I do and what I stand for.

I am convinced and I thank God that everything I said when I was in charge, came to pass.It is not that I am a soothsayer but it is just that I’m being professional.I analyse any situation properly and give my candid opinion.

I told you guys sometime ago that the Super Eagles is an average team that requires a lot of time to mature. I said I was managing the team to qualify for the World Cup then because we were so desperate to be there and that after qualification, the team will get better and better. I said we need time.People said I was talking rubbish. I went ahead and told you people ( Media Professionals) that the league was dying so it cannot churn out players that will refurbish the national team until we reorganize it and do things properly . People said Amodu was talking rubbish.

Every other  person who has come in, has not gone to the league to pick any player. Even the whiteman they brought thinking that will bring them the World Cup, he didn’t even win one game. He collected 1.5  million dollars and left, The people who gave him the money are not in jail today, they did not  even regret the act

They just dismantled the good job we were doing. The Presidential Task Force was responsible for that. John Mastoroudes was not with them, he told them the truth but they did not listen. He worked with me  closely and saw the problems. Okocha too worked with me closely  and saw the problems too. The people who were distancing themselves from me because they have political  ambition to go into NFF to remove Lulu, were  the ones who convinced the Head of the Task Force to remove me.  He didn’t know football. You can write all these because I am not afraid.

Those people in the Presidential Task Force should be the ones to take responsibilities for what is happening now. They convinced  President Jonathan to sack me that time, they dismantled our national team and caused the problems we are presently facing.

They believe that until somebody plays international football, it is then you can  manage footballers who are playing presently. That is what put us where we are now and they are running away from taking the blame. Nigerians should hold them responsible for my being relieved from the Super Eagles job, until they come to apologize and own up to the fact that they made that mistake, I don’t think they are serious.

All the monies they collected from Nigerians on the guise that they will use it to support the Super Eagles, have they rendered account? They have not rendered any account of those funds till tomorrow.

You spoke about the Nigerian Premier league not being up to scratch then and there have not been many  changes up till now. What really is the problem?

The Nigeria League has become a caricature. A caricature in the sense that there is no semblance of a professional structure in any of their  clubsides. At best what we have is a glorified professional league where all our players are earning nothing, either in sign on fees or salaries. The clubs are owing in arrears.

So it is not enticing to the players themselves. They are suffering, they are in slavery and because they are playing with so much hunger, they cannot  play well, their levels of football knowledge will not improve. That is number  one.

 Number two, we lack  many qualified and experienced coaches in the league today. So many of us have been frustrated out of the system. All the clubs are government owned. We need private participation but it is when the economy is good enough that the private companies will come in, only then will our football  start improving.

Not until that starts happening and we have good Coaches and good Managers, will the  league improve . There is also the need for us to stop appointing people on political basis. People  who will see such appointment as a means of making money for whatever patronage they have given the Governor ,embezzling money amd leaving the players in hunger. That is the problem.   

So in essense, what you are saying is that the level of coaching has dropped drastically too?
All I am saying is that there are no more matured coaches in the league.The experienced ones have been frustrated out for the younger ones, most of whom cannot raise their voices when the Managers are pocketing the money.You know some of us will not take rubbish from these people, but we have some who will take anything just to make sure they have a job. They  know the job but cannot take a stand  on issues concerning their players’ welfare. When the players’ welfare is not taken care off, then you cannot expect them to give their best.

What about the coaches,  the old and the new ones coming together to fight this malaise?
What common cause are you talking about, we cannot employ ourselves. It is the Administrators who should lay down the regulations and put the right  structures in place. If they do that things will work.

On a final note, where  would you like to see Nigerian football in  five years time?

If we put the right structures in place, somebody like me will invest. If we do the right things our football will move forward.