Pride goes before a fall. (Igbo Proverb)
You can't plant an Iroko tree, it grows naturally. (Igbo Proverb)
If a baby goat kneels down, it will be able to suck its mother's breast. (Igbo Proverb)

will make it very short and simple. The Nigerian National Team that played Ghana during one of the quarterfinal matches in the on going African Cup of Nations are just a disgrace to themselves. As far as football is concerned, I will hide my face in shame for a long time to come.

advertisement

Before the start of that match, a commentator commenting about the match described the Nigerian national team as "super cocks" based on their performances so far prior to their match against Ghana and wondered if they will live up to their name as super eagles by soaring high against Ghana. After the match, I can't help but agreeing with the commentator intoto; there was nothing to show that they were "super eagles".

In as much as both the players and their coach are to be blamed for this ignominious exit, the players never proved that they have a single idea about how football should be played. Imagine that our team lost to a Ghanaian side that was one man down. How on earth can an eleven-man Nigerian Team go down to a ten-man Ghanaian team? Nigerian team failed to capitalise on the red card given to the Ghanaian captain. No team that knows its onion can waste such opportunity for victory handed to them on a platter. It is a shame, Nigeria has no National Team. The U-20 National Team has being a failure also, only the U-16 National Team is living up to its billing or else Nigerian football is going down the drain and something must be down and fast too to rescue it from the downward spiral it has taken.

About the coach, I have said it before that Berti Vogts canīt take our football to the enviable heights we all are yearning for based on his past records. He hasn't been successful in his career as a coach anywhere and will never be in Nigeria ; anybody hoping for him to perform miracle will wait for eternity; go through his coaching history to see that he has been a failure all through. I wonder who employed him as a coach and why? A Nigerian born coach would have performed better than Berti Vogts; Christian Chukwu or Austin Eguavoen would have achieved more success than the German. Berti Vogtsī contract should be terminated with immediate effect; he helped in killing our football.

In my article of Tuesday, July 17, 2007 published in this website, I wrote this:

There is no way that people that weren't footballers before can run the NFA well. Football administrators should be former footballers who know what it takes to play the game and how to organise it better. NFA is in disarray, not knowing its right from its left. That is why the German, Berti Vogts, employed as the Trainer of the National Team insults and treats them with contempt and gets away with it.

For Berti Vogts to be insulting Nigeria on almost daily basis in words and actions and still remains in his position is a mystery to me. No German employer of labour, be it government or individuals, can tolerate an insult from an employee, a foreigner for that matter.

Bert Vogts has never been successful as a coach. As a player, he was good and was in the German Squad that won the World Cup in 1974. In Club side level, the team he played for, Borussia Moenchengladbach dominated German football after Bayern Munich and won all the club side laurels including Champions League Cup many times. But, Berti Vogts as a coach has been a disaster; he coached German, Scottish, Kuwaiti national teams respectively (if I am not mistaken) and a German Club side by name, Bayer Leverkusen, without any major success. I doubt if his fortunes will change with the Green Eagles. He was the assistant coach to Franz Beckenbauer that led the Germans to the 1990 World Cup success in Italy. Beckenbauer resigned after the championship and handed the team over to Berti Vogts. The German national team success started fluctuating during his time; he managed only to win the European Nations Cup for Germany in England in 1996 and thereafter the team became a shadow of itself making Berti Vogts to resign under pressure. I think Berti Vogts should quit his job in Nigeria and concentrate more on his MacDonald Restaurants in Moenchengldbach (he has MacDonald's franchise).

Berti Vogts said last month during an interview with a German Tabloid that he will never live in Nigeria because "Nigeria is a dangerous place with no security". He is shuttling from his base in Moenchengldbach , Germany to Nigeria only few days before each Eaglesī match. Tell me how he can achieve success? He said that Nigerian players are undisciplined. I don't doubt him.

He and his friend, Ferguson of Manchester United, in making a jest about MKO Abiola Stadium Abeokuta, where the Eagles played their first match with Vogts as Coach, said that he "can't even graze his horses in that pitch, not to talk of playing football there." Berti Vogts snubbed the NFA so many times and got away with it.

In Vanguard of Thursday, June 28, 2007, Barrister Adokiye Amiesimaka, an ex-international, faulted the hiring of Berti Vogts for Nigeria:

"Amiesimaka said that Nigeria was wasting its resources with the hiring of a foreigner to take us to the El-dorado. In the history of the World Cup, no foreigner has helped any country to win it. All the countries that have won the world Cup won it with their indigenous coaches. In spite of the excellent record of Nigerian coaches in international competitions, we still prefer to engage the services of foreigners at a cost that virtually empties our treasury, even though we may have little or no control over them. What is patriotic about not building on the achievement of Nigerian coaches? Was it not the duo of Sebastian Broderick Imasuen and Christian Chukwu that won the maiden edition of U-16 World Cup in 1985? He said that Nigeria had the talents and resources to be among the best in the world regretting that the problem was that we have refused to acknowledge that our salvation was in our own hands, and that the Europeans and the South Americans were not excited about how well we can imitate them. The solution resides in Nigerians at large who must demand that the NFA strictly accounts for its decisions and actions. But at the end of the day, it is the combined decisions and actions of the administrators, the coaches and the players that determine the quality of performance of a team".

No team that is worth its name can lose a match when playing a team that was a man down; yes it can happen, but, not in a tournament of this nature. I am disturbed by this development. It means that our football is dying faster than we first thought; this can't be a performance from a Nigerian Team, not, when Nigeria created a big name for its football through the performances displayed by the Super Eagles of those days during USA ī94 and France ī98. The problem is that the players are too rich in their thinking and are feeling too big; money and fame have gotten into their heads that they are feeling to be on top of the world, but, success will not come to them unless they work hard for it. The so called "super eagles" are too rich and have stuffed their pockets with lots of money that is weighing them down thereby preventing them from flying high again. They must shed off the ton of money in their pockets and will have cool heads before soaring high again or else this will be the beginning of their many failures to come.

Ghanaian team surprised me in that the going out of their captain never deterred them, infact the exit of their captain even re-energised them as they started playing better when they were ten against eleven Nigerians and the Nigerian team became worst when they have the advantage of a man more. Instead of them making good use of the advantage, they started faltering against a ten-man Ghanaian Team, what a shame! The Nigerian National Team right from the start of this tournament has been a complete disappointment; their first three matches were all disasters and they advanced into the next stage by a stroke of luck, they have blown everything and should return to Nigeria to answer a plethora of questions Nigerians have for them. It seems that the rot that has eaten deep into every facet of life in Nigeria has finally caught up with our football, the only joy bringer and the only uniting factor for Nigerians. It is only football that invokes nationalistic feeling in all Nigerians; we are all Nigerians during football matches involving our national team against another national team; Nigerians used to forget their differences, sorrows and pains whenever our national team is playing against another national team. The current national team through their performances in Ghana has taken away a huge joy and pride from many Nigerians. I wonder what the situation will be in Nigeria today they lost this match; which they supposed to win, against a depleted Ghanaian side?

What went wrong and why? This must be time for serious stock-taking. May football day like this one we just experienced never come our way again. If we can't perform, no need sending the "super cocks" as "super eagles" only to shatter the hopes, joys and dreams of millions of Nigerians.