Ex-Nigeria international Segun Odegbami has called on the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) to entrust home-grown coaches with the responsibility of developing the game at all levels in the country.
Odegbami’s call is coming after the Super Eagles failed to win the just-concluded 2019 Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) in Egypt, where they finished third under the tutelage of Franco-German tactician, Gernot Rohr.
“I’m not a racist, but I think this our colonial vestige should stop here and now, that everything white is good and everything black is not good enough,” the 1980 AFCON winner said on TV Plus Africa.
“I think we need to start to look inward at our own people. We have whole generations of players who have played well, who have trained (as coaches). We have to give them a chance, we have to involve them at the grassroots, involve them in the schools. These are former international players, they are all over the place,” the 66-year-old Super Eagles and Shooting Stars legend said.
The NFF have often preferred the hiring of foreign coaches for the senior men’s national team to their local counterparts. In spite of the successes achieved by the likes of Christian Chukwu, Austin Eguavoen and late Stephen Keshi and Amodu Shuaibu (the former leading Nigeria to the AFCON title in 2013 and a second-round place at the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, the latter qualifying Nigeria for the 2002 and 2010 World Cups in addition to a couple of third-place finishes at the AFCON), the Glass House still think they are not good enough.
