Sports
Amokachi Set To Take Over Super Eagles
Nigeria coach Shuaibu Amodu will have to win his next game against Benin convincingly or see himself shunted aside for his assistant Daniel Amokachi to take charge for the rest of the Nations Cup, while Mozambique coach Mart Nooij is favoured for the World Cup.
Tuesday’s defeat to Egypt has seen the pressure on Amodu rise to unbearable levels and the Nigeria contingent held no less than three meetings on Wednesday as they sought to find a way forward, with confidence in Amodu’s abilities falling to a dismal low.
The Nigeria Football Federation (NFF), executive committee have previously backed Amodu publicly, but our source understands that a heated meeting on Wednesday saw the majority of board members asking for Amodu to be asked to ‘step aside’ with immediate effect and hand over to Amokachi for the rest of the competition.
However, NFF chairman, Sani Lulu Abdullahi would have none of it and insisted that Amodu be given at least one more game, against Benin, to save his job.
For the World Cup, the bulk of the NFF Executive Committee are in favour of Nooij, who is currently in charge of Mozambique.
Nooij’s major edge over other contenders, including Claude Leroy who is in Angola, is his deep knowledge of the Nigerian team and players after scouting them during the qualifiers, and again for the Nations Cup.
“There is no time between now and the World Cup for someone to try to study the team and we need somebody who already knows the players and understands the team,” a top official of the NFF said.
An additional advantage for Nooij is that he is Dutch, and favours the 4-4-2 formation which most Nigerians prefer with an emphasis on wingers. The NFF top brass have also been impressed by the job the Dutchman has done with the Mambas.
Another NFF official however said that although there has been no contact with Nooij recently, there has been ‘informal’ contact in the past and is confident a deal can be thrashed out after the Nations Cup.
England captain Harry Kane netted a hat-trick to guide Bayern Munich to an impressive victory against Stuttgart.
Kane’s goals, plus one from Kingsley Coman, helped Bayern end a three-game winless run in all competitions.
They faced a tough task against a Stuttgart side who sat back and limited their chances, leading Vincent Kompany’s side to enter the break frustrated and with the deadlock unbroken.
Bayern eventually found a way past Stuttgart’s steely defence when Kane drilled a low effort into the bottom corner from around 30 yards out after Joshua Kimmich overturned possession.
Former Nigeria goalkeeper, Dosu Joseph, is full of thanks to God after he miraculously survived another life-threatening automobile accident recent at Kara, along the Lagos-Ibadan Express Way, where a heavy-duty truck ran into his SUV.
Narrating his ordeal, the 51-year-old, who guided Nigeria to gold in the Men’s Football Tournament of the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, broke the news in a statement on his social media handles on Friday.
“To God be the glory, another death escaped by Grace and Mercy of God. Me and my friend SM were at Enyo Filling Station after Ojodu Berger bus stop to get fuel on Wednesday, October 2, 2024, around 6 p.m. when this MACK truck fully loaded with iron, with registration number LND 470 XX, left the road and crushed my car beyond repairs. Thank God for life,” he stated.
This is the second time the soft-spoken club proprietor will cheat death by a whisker, having been involved in an accident in 1997 that ended his career at 23 and left his spinal cord in bad shape.
He helped Julius Berger win the Nigeria FA Cup in November 1997 shortly a memorable Olympic outing by keeping a clean sheet in the finals against Katsina United. The following year, he was involved in the auto along Ikorodu Road, Lagos, which not only cut his career short but also left him almost paralysed, ending his spell at Serie A club Reggiana.
The former Nigeria international, who also kept goal for Julius Berger FC, said the case has been reported to Isheri Police Station, Ogun State, where the driver is currently detained and the truck also seized.
According to him, the owner of the truck said he can’t fix the badly damaged SUV until after a year.
Ex – Super Eagles of Nigeria, Okwuchukwu Waobikeze has observed that sports development in Nigeria is going down.
According to him, grassroots sports is very important, without it, the administrators cannot get it right. So everybody should key into grassroots sports development, he said.
Waobikeze said this last Wednesday in an interview with sports journalists shortly after the Port Harcourt All Stars Independence football festival (OCTOBERFEST) at the Port Harcourt club, Rivers State.
He explained that for sports administrators to get it right, grassroots development is key. “They should be organising competition at the grassroots level to fish out the young ones for different sporting activities.
“Grassroots sports is very important so the administrators have to go back to the grassroots.
” Sports Development in Nigeria is going down we need to go back to the basics.
“Look at the just concluded Paris Olympics, Nigeria did not win any medal.
” Our football team did not even qualify for the Olympics. We are going down.
” If they should go back to the grassroots, they will get young ones in the games and talents will be developed.
” I started from school games, to youth games before playing for the national team. Now everybody wants to fly board to play professional football and a lot do not know the basics of the game.
” A lot of people did not know the little things about the game, they just want to play. It is not done so,” Waobikeze stated.
Kiadum Edookor