Kano Pillars Technical Adviser, Ibrahim Musa believes that the inability of the Sai Masu Gida to pick points away from home this season is down to a lack of quality in the squad.

Pillars have enjoyed a Jekyll and Hyde start to the 2018/2019 Nigeria Professional Football League (NPFL) season that has seen them pick just one point away from home in a goalless draw against Plateau United on Matchday 5.

Although their form, in general, has been iffy – they suffered a winless four-game spell following the opening day one-nil victory over Heartland in Kano – eyebrows were still raised when they fell 2-1 away to newly promoted side Go Round FC on Matchday 7.

They now visit minnows and fellow Northern side Kada City in a northern derby and Musa who was recently reappointed to his role believes that a club of Pillars’ stature should be approaching every match home or away with the intention of securing maximum points.

“Kano Pillars is a great team, when we go to [Kada City] and win it is nothing new, our plan is to go and win not just at Kada but we need to pick three points in any away game we play,” he said.

A major reason that has stymied the team on their travels according to Musa who is quick to point out that he has only taken charge of two away games (a goalless draw at Plateau United and a two-nil defeat at Go Round FC although he had been appointed Technical Adviser of team when they lost two-nil at Gombe United, he was yet to take charge) is the club’s poor recruitment in the off-season which he believes failed to adequately replace many departed “quality” players including last season’s top scorer in the league Junior Lokosa and he attributes his side’s struggles this season to this lack of quality in the squad.

“I have only had two away matches with the team, when the team recruited players they didn’t recruit quality players and we have to go and work in that area because the players we recruited they are good but they need time,” he told busybuddiesng.com.

“Pillars need quality players for now, if you look at last season we recruited many quality players but we [also] lost quality players. If you look at Jamilu [Mohammed], Al Hassan [Ibrahim], Nazifi [Yahaya], Junior [Lokosa] all of whom were quality players so we don’t have the quality players for now but notwithstanding we work as a team and we get the results.

“I appreciate the way my boys played and followed my instructions, we still have a long way to go because Kano Pillars deserve to go away and win not even draw, my plan is to go away and win because we want to top the group.”