WITH the Golden Eaglets crashing out of the Africa Under-17 Championship slated for Algeria next year, the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) will likely announce the sack of the team's handler, Alphonsus Dike, today in Abuja.



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For the first time in many years, the Eaglets, who won the African cadet championship last year in Togo before going ahead to conquer the rest of the world in Korea, failed to book a ticket to the African qualifiers no thanks to a 3-2 aggregate loss to their Beninoise counterparts.

Consequently, they will not be on hand to defend the title their predecessors won at the previous edition. The uninspiring Eaglets had managed to win the first leg 2-0 in Port Harcourt two weeks ago before a ruthless Young Squirrels of Benin sent them packing on Sunday with a 3-0 humiliating defeat in Cotonou.

Speaking with The Guardian yesterday shortly on arrival from Cotonou, Chairman of the NFF's Technical Committee, Taiwo Ojunjobi, said that an emergency meeting of the committee would hold today in Abuja to review the Eaglets match in Cotonou, among other matters affecting the football house.

"I just returned from Cotonou and will be heading to Abuja for an emergency meeting of the technical committee, which will hold tomorrow (today)," he said. "I don't have much to say at the moment on the Golden Eaglets' failure until we have deliberated on the issue. All I can say now is that we were beaten 3-0 in Cotonou."

Sunday's mockery of the Eaglets by the Young Squirrels of Benin came just as the Nigerian Local Organising Committee (LOC) of the 2009 FIFA Under-17 World Cup is moving round media houses on familiarisation tour, canvassing support for the team in its bid to retain the world title next year. Nigeria will be hosting the FIFA Under-17 championship in four cities next year.

It was learnt yesterday that the technical committee of the NFF was putting the blame of the defeat on coach Dike for his alleged poor technical input to the game, especially the first leg in Port Harcourt, where the Eaglets fumbled in front of goal on several occasions. President of the NFF, Sani Lulu, his first vice, Amanze Uchegbulam, and board member, Princess Bola Jegede, were among those that watched the Eaglets being disgraced by the Young Squirrels of Benin on Sunday.

An angry Uchegbulam was said to have declared shortly after the Eaglets crashed out that coach Dike's days in the Eaglets were numbered, saying that the NFF gave the handlers all the support they needed to overcome their Beninoise counterparts in the qualifiers.

The last time Nigeria suffered such a humiliating exit on African soil was in 2005, when the Eaglets, under the leadership of coach Godwin Izilien, failed to book a ticket in Banjul, The Gambia, to the World Under-17 championship in Peru.

The Eaglets won the Under-17 African Championship title in Togo last year under now late coach Yemi Tela before conquering the world in Seoul, South Korea.

http://odili.net/news/source/2008/sep/16/9.html
http://www.kickoffnigeria.com/static/news/article.php?id=2623

This means that this guys won't get to defend there title, what a pity.

Chei, how did this Alphonsus Dike get the job in the first place, why didn't they give the job to Ben Iroha who was the assistant last time. You guys see how Nigerians simply looooooooooooove to shoot themselves in the foot.



IN FACT WE SHOULD START A PETITION TO FIRE SANNI LULU!!!!!.

Its pitiful!! i always had my doubts for that team after we could only manage a 1-0 victory against Benin so who do we blame for the mishap? i think the coach should be fired pronto before he disgraces us in the world stage

Some of dis coaches are technically inferior, and they lack ideas. We have new and upcoming coaches that should be given the jobs, not pot bellied idiots who don't know squat about football. The NFF needs to right this wrong now. I want both bosso and dike to go, they lack ideas and technical know-how

that's why i said the NFA should sponsor every coach of all national teams to go to Europe to get a UEFA Pro License and a UEFA 'A' License, that's the solution and while they are at it, they should start bone marrow testing so that we can start knowing the real age of this players.

At least we`ll defend the world cup we won, to me that is more important!!!

Raimond:

At least we`ll defend the world cup we won, to me that is more important!!!

The world cup is very important but the truth is no more preparation for the team again. The FA we have are just useless. The Nations cup woul have been used as friendly for the team but now that they are out expect us to crash out in the first round when they world cup starts.

Raimond and yommys01, do you guys know what you are talking about? In order to qualify for the U17 World Cup, you have to be one of the top 3 teams (1st, 2nd or 3rd) in the African youth championships but Nigeria failed to even qualify for the African youth championship because we lost to Benin of all people.

@davidif
We are hosts which means we are automatically through to the tournament