Examining Nigeria’s shocking 1-0 loss to Guinea-Bissau in the AFCON qualifying round
It was clear that Jose Mourinho was contacted when the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) named the Portuguese as the next Super Eagles head coach.
The previous NFF chairman, Amaju Pinnick, said, “Of course Mourinho, I am not going to tell you we didn’t talk to Mourinho because we did and the (sports) minister also talked to Mourinho and there is nothing wrong with it.”
The football Peseiro has offered us may not have come as a surprise.
It has occasionally resembled the monotonous, lifeless, and fragmented style of play that Mourinho’s Roma employs every other week in Serie A.
Nigeria has a three-game losing streak going into Friday’s Africa Cup of Nations qualifier versus Guinea-Bissau at the Abuja National Stadium.
Nonetheless, you would anticipate that the Eagles would defeat the Djurtus and put a stop to it.
They failed to.
They defeated Nigeria for the first time in their history thanks to Mama Balde’s goal in the opening period of the game.
The second half was spent by Peseiro’s team meandering about a terrible field and hurling crosses at Victor Osimhen and Paul Onuachu.
What went wrong, then?
“A composite of all things. Temisan Okomo, a sports journalist/presenter with Classic FM and Lagos Talks913, tells Opagnews that there was poor coaching, unmotivated players, particularly up top, a terrible surface, and that godforsaken Abuja venue.
Before moving to the US to cover the NBA, Ayotunde Onabolu was Inspiration FM’s Head of Sports. He maintains that the players should bear the majority of the burden.
After Nigeria’s failure to qualify for the Qatar 2022 World Cup, Victor Osimhen pledged to reporters two days into the game that they would do everything in their ability to win the hearts of the country. Considering this, I anticipated that the Super Eagles would start strong yet patiently, especially considering that Guinea Bissau was the obvious underdogs.
“What I observed was an uncoordinated squad that lacked cohesiveness. The middle has much too many holes. The few times the wingers did manage to dribble into the area, their final ball was terrible. The wingers believed they could accomplish this. They had the ball in hand, but because they lacked imagination, Guinea Bissau was able to defend as if they were elite defenders quite easily.
Nigeria is still my nation, and even though I am absolutely upset, I have hope that the squad will get better, Onabolu remarked.
The improvement must happen right away. In three days, Guinea-Bissau will host the opposite match, and they’ll be hoping to take the lead in Group A.
Okomi, though, continues to hold out hope that the Eagles’ performance in the second half in Abuja will matter at the Stadium 24 de Setembro in Bissau on Monday.
“But, in the second half, we looked better.
Perhaps a narrow 1-0 victory as well, he continued.
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