The Super Eagles and the New Approach

“Recreate your life, always, always. Remove the stones, plant rose bushes and make sweets. Begin again.”
This encouraging line from Cora Coralina aptly suggests (way forward) and advises Nigerian football stakeholders – administrators, fans and players – as we begin another era in the chapter of our beloved Senior national team, the Super Eagles.The Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) had on Tuesday April 21 confirmed the substantive reappointment of the only man alive to have won the Africa Cup of Nations both as a player and coach, Stephen Keshi as the Chief Coach of the Super Eagles on a 2-year deal. That ended months of uncertainty surrounding the position and regardless of anyone’s opinion or disposition towards the decision of the Federation, life must go on with Stephen Keshi.
The results, records, successes and failures of Stephen Keshi between 2012 January and 2014 December are well documented and I will spare myself some writing space by avoiding some needless repetitions as I can only try to highlight why I honestly think Mr Keshi can be successful as our national team coach again.

1. He’s been there before.
Gifted British writer Matt Haig wrote in his novel, The Humans “And yet, when everything is alien the alien becomes familiar.” The sort of feeling that Stephen Keshi must have had in the last quarter of 2014 is one that would have shocked him how he fell from a record-equalling feat in Brazil few months earlier to a figure that was disliked by many Nigerians and went in and out of the job that brought him good image and acceptability a couple of years earlier.
It was an anti-climax but in the face of the disappointment, Keshi now finds himself in a very familiar situation. When he first got the job in 2012, Nigerians were still smarting from the pains brought by the non-qualification for AFCON in 2012. He knew what he did then and how he went about it and it is expected that this and other lessons he must have learnt will make him stronger and in good position to turn it around again.

2. Renewed resolve to imbibe team-work.
During his contract-signing ceremony, Stephen Keshi uttered words of a broken and renewed man, calling on all to join hands with him to make the team great once again. “All” in this context clearly implies the football house and the relevant committees, media and the fans.

Having identified that the key ingredient for a tasty product in team sport is the collaboration of all forces, it is quite ominous to note that Keshi’s brokenness will put this at the fore-front with every worthy Nigerian (footballer)  given opportunity to make the Eagles super again.

The composition of the NFF’s Technical and Development committee is one that offers a great deal of help (when needed) to the national team technical crew. The presence of former national team players such as Victor Ikpeba, Mutiu Adepoju and Patrick Pascal in the technical team as well as a Technical Study group headed by the maestro, Jay-Jay Okocha is in line with best practices in countries such as Brazil, Argentina and Germany where former colleague and/or friends of the national team handler are always available for hints and helps in the Federation Technical Committee.

3. Technological inputs and modern-day technique:
Just in case you don’t know, football globally has gone scientific and team coaches and trainers now have the luxury of the advancement in technology and Sports science to bring out the best in their players and teams.

The Nigeria Football Federation recently procured the Prozone Software which is expected to assist the national team gaffer in diverse tasks such as scouting of players, scouting of opponents and of course conducting proper analyses of players’ performances. There are many talented Nigerians scattered across the globe and ready to give their best to the national teams if and when invited and in order to avert mistakes of the past when such players falter in their initial appearances, the Prozone Software avails the National team handlers opportunity to careful scout for the players in view, assessing their strengths, weaknesses, preferred positions and areas at which they would be most useful for the team.

These are enough pointers to the direction the new Super Eagles is heading and if they can be carefully executed with proper articulation, the team will grow in no time to dominate Africa, nay the World again.

The word “again” has been consciously repeated in this piece because memories of 1994 & 96 still fresh and Nigerian soccer fans really want and deserve to have their team on top again. The Super Eagles may be ranked 45th in the May FIFA Rankings but with all hands on deck and support from all Nigerians as usual, the efforts of the present NFF Executive to make the Eagles a Super brand will come to fruition within a short period.