₦airaland Forum

FBS:
@one mopol,
Groups A & C are the tightest though It's hard to predict now. Perhaps after the second round matches we may get a clearer picture.

You are not wrong jare, our chances as best loser is getting even slimmer by the day.

The only way we can benefit from group A will be if Egypt loses their last match to Italy, which is very unlikely considering home support,FIFA and the fact that Italy will field a second string team since they have already qualified.

For group C it is certain that either USA or Korea will definitely make 4 points which makes our chances slimmer. Cameroon only needs a draw against germany, except for top spot of the group, the Germans really have little to play for.

@FBS

Can there be a case where more than 3 countries qualify from a group? I mean if every team in a group makes 4 points , will they all qualify considering the best loser proviso?

chic2pimp:
U guys no dey shame abi?

Una dey bring Van Basten into your crazy arguement.

Did I hear you say crazy? Just kool down , You hear?

Nobody dey happy say we never win or score but we no fit deny say the boys dey try put body for the matches to get the result anyhow.

FBS:
Sorry if I did but can you give me his stats for the 2 matches?

The stats so far is simply that we have not scored a goal. Bad yes , but it happens.
Sincerely I would not want this to sound like I am now a voice for Fatai or any of them. I am actually speaking for the team , that sometimes when things dont work out , it does not necesarily mean the players are not good.

Van basten is still adored today as one of the best strikers the world has seen. In Italia 90 when the whole world expected him to shine he could not even score an offside goal in the entire tornament (4 matches). My point is that sometimes these things happen in football. We may bounce back anyway. who knows.

FBS:
I'm sorry but this not tell me that he was/is a top marksman in romania.
Go to Agege, you will find better strikers.

You are getting me confused here. I sincerely do not know what you are driving at.

@FBS

I was also rewatching the match against venezuela , when Fatai came in ,the TV commentor (Not nigerian) said that he watched the training session of the FE the previous day and he saw that every ball Fatai kicked was hitting target and he hoped the guy would showcase same in a real match scenario

FBS:
Reports? Can you post them online for us to read?

Challenges keep mounting for the Flying Eagles at the FIFA U-20 World Cup as the team’s attacking personnel has been striped to its barest minimum.
Despite losing its second match in the tournament 0-2 to Spain on Monday, the Eagles still have an outside chance to make it into the second round as one of the four best third-place finishers from the competition’s six groups if they run up a cricket score victory over Tahiti on Thursday.
But prospects of that happening seem to be dimming after Complete Sports found out that there could just be only one striker available to the Eagles for the encounter.
Team captain, Odion Ighalo, who has led the front line for the Eagles since EGYPT 2009 got under way, talked himself out of contention against Tahiti when he bagged a second yellow card in successive matches for persistent harassment of the referee.
The Udinese of Italy marksman had got his name in the arbiter’s book for the same offence against Venezuela.
Gbolahan Salami, a winger who has played as a central striker for the Eagles in the past, is also forced out of the game after he was shown a straight red card against Spain.
The probable absence of the Nigerian junior national team’s other forward liners on Thursday is on medical grounds.
Romania-based Kehinde Fatai, who came into the tournament as the Eagles best goals prospect following his net-shaking exploits during the team’s preparation, went down to sickness even before the end of the Spain tie.
Fatai, it was revealed to Complete Sports, had complained of headache even before the match, which he started, and could not return for the second half after he started vomiting in the dressing room during the interval.
It remains to be seen how well he will recover in the next two days before the game against Tahiti as he is expected to sit out Tuesday morning’s training.
Stanley Ohawuchi, who took Fatai’s central attacking place on Monday, will himself not finish the game after he was elbowed in an off-the-ball incident in the 62nd minute.
The Bayelsa United forward, who finished the last season in Nigeria as one of the top scorers before his transfer to Atletico Baleares of Spain, would be taken to hospital and only joined the rest of the team at their hotel two and half hours after the game.
Despite being discharged from hospital, Ohawuchi was still not fully okay as he told Complete Sports that he could not stand straight and was also having problems walking, making him a big doubt for the October 1 match.
With the likely absence of four players in the Eagles attack, Nigeria could be going into their last Group B game with only one recognisable striker in Daniel Chima Uchechi.

http://www.completesportsnigeria.com/2009/09/strikers-crisis-hits-flying-eagles/

FBS:
Well if they don't score against Tahiti then you should know that definitely there is a problem. But again scoring against Tahiti shouldn't be the yardstick now. A team that conceded 16 goals in 2 matches?

When they carry the cup. . .then we can all take back our words, until then there are no "good" strikers in that team.

PS: I want to make it clear that Siasia is NOT a bad coach. No one ever said he is/was.

If our first match had been against tahiti, we sure would have seen a better FE by now. For their age and exposure the boys seem to be playing under a lot of pressure, hence a first goal even against the weakest side in the world would help shore up more confidence for the strikers in front of goal. Reports have it that fatai is an exceptional striker that the coaches expected to shine in the competetion.

The truth is we may not get up to 8 goals past tahiti like spain and venzuela did. Tahiti will atleast be more cautious in their defending now, besides they had 2 red cards against venzuela. I just believe 5 goals might just be enough to get us through.

n-guage:
I like Siasia as much as the next Nigerian but sometimes his actions are unexplainable. I thought Rabiu Ibrahim was injured, turns out he wasn't. How are we sure that the first choice GK, Ajiboye, is truly injured. Remember the olympics finals, Ogbuke sat on the bench all through the game. When Nigerians complained, Siasia said, "Oh, he was injured." How come he got injured so suddenly?

The lack of a clinical finisher in the team is another puzzling fact. What about Chrisantus or even Worgu? The strikers in our team right now, all of them, are more like wingers and assistant strikers. So, there, we went to an international tournament without a goal scorer. It has happened in the past but we always have very good wingers and half-way strikers to make up for the lack of a goal poacher. This time, average wingers.

You must be the only one who does not know that Ogbuke's jaw was broken in the semi final match against Belgium, that Siasia even regreted not pulling him out of the match earlier.

You also did not hear that Christiantus is injured and Oseni did not show up in camp.

Yes he risked Rabiu in the match against Spain but every professional knows that sometimes the is the most foolish thing to do. Playing with injury before full recovery has terminated the career of a lot of footballers. Ask Amuneke,Amokachi Micheal Essien , Joe cole and you know what I am saying.

But remember that in football everything turns bad on a bad day, yes even if you introduce Messi. The strikers in the current team can finish off any team on their day.

Lets just hope that the boys can perform against Tahiti and scrap into the next round, probably some people on this forum will have opportunity to recant.

Akwasi:
Final score Ghana 4 England 0.

That serves them right for taking our ancestors as slaves and calling themselves even now our 'colonial masters'

Wish it was 7 so that England would have been spelt

My friend if you want to teach the English a lesson because of slave trade, then do that with the 3 lions(senior team) and not this age grade competition where we Africans are rarely truthful.

Thanks to Ghana anyway. Results like this give us some hope that our team might just get to the next round as one of the best losers.

Dereformer:
(C) ALL BUDGETARY APPROPRIATION TO FOOTBALL SHOULD BE CHANNELED TOWARDS ENSURING STEADY POWER SUPPLY. THAT WAY NIGERIA WILL BE BETTER. PERIOD.

So your understanding of the power problems of this country is that enough money has not been budgeted abi? I LAUGH IN ARABIC

novaman:
suddenly some people see Siasia as a bad coach, funny the way people think in this country, I have watch almost all tha matches in the tournament and I can state categorically that the Flying Eagles are one of the most composed team, considering that fact that the coach was assigned to the team barely 3months ago

Thanks man.

-Yes sure no crime in playing a MF as a defender but why do that when you have a defender to use?

Monday James and Ambrose efe are two known top performing defenders. When Siasia drafted chibuzor okoronkwo from the midlfield( a  right footed player)  to man the left full back, ordinarily it looked weird. But in the end we saw that he did the job even better than the real defenders. Besides lets not forget that the coaches would have watched him play in the central defence before they exposed him(Obiora nwakwo) to a full match. Yes sometimes somethings go well during training sessions but the real match response fall short. The coach recognised this and re-drafted him to his normal position. The question is, has the defense really faired better after placing the real defenders in their position?. That in itself is a debate for another time.

- Ighalo had only one shot at goal (against Venezuela) and you think that is good enough for a striker ? Maybe even at my age I can still play for the national team then?
In our two games, only two strikes from distance (on target). That of Aluko (against Spain) and Igahlo. Others (about 20 of them) went to stand 520! You think that is good enough?

I am not sure this is exactly true, however I will have to re-watch the matches to make further comments on this. But like I said earlier , BARCA does not shoot from long range and they are UCL champions.

- - Haruna took only one freekick, which was really good but was saved by the keeper but unluckily he got a red. Are you now saying that No Haruna no free kick for Naija again? There are about 20+ players in that team for goodness sake.

While it is nice to have , I have stated earlier that even in our glory days USA94 and ATLANTA96 we did not have a very good set piece specialist. But that did not hinder the team from attaining good results.

- Ighalo may have been chosen by his teamates to be their captain (at least according to you and I will take your word for it) but tell me sincerely, is he good enough to be a captain? I would have thought, Siasia can do better than that.
- Are you saying that Ighalo is showing the hunger and passion you talked about?

From a personal point of view I have not found any  of the players (may be  except haruna) in the team that lack hunger.Sincerely thats my take. If this hunger has translated into the needed result in  our matches so far  is another question all together. Here I see psychology being the problem and not skill, the pressure of possible exit is getting the better of the boys.

For Ighalo we must understand that the team selection has been made largely on the strength of training sessions and a few low-key tune up matches. The coach will not be wrong to base his judgement of the players on this few tests. Yes we have seen cases where second-fiddle players in training sessions become heros. Messi started the 2005 U-20 as a sub for argentina. I am sure IGHALO would have greatly impressed. That lone strike against venezuela is world class. A good foreign coach will just use that to judge that he his a material that can be worked upon.
I am however suprised that I am the only one that knows that he was picked by the players in an open election between him and Chima uchechi.












[quote][/quote]

FBS:
The way you place quote tags got me off track but I will try to answer as much as I can.

I am sorry about that. I have placed them correctly now. I think you can read me better now.

@FBS

Are you saying playing a MF as a defender is a good thing?

There is nothing special in that my guy , in tornaments like this teams always have players that can play more than one position. A good DM like obiora nwakwo is supposed to have basic defensive instincts. Do you know that chibuzo okonrokwo who siasia used as a replacement for taiwo is a MF?. Sometimes a coach after workouts in training sessions try out this things in time of need. What is key however  is that a coach should be honest enough to know when it is not working as planned and revert. Siasia did just that. Oliseh started as a central defender, Essien has played almost every defensive position in chelsea. Didier drogba started as a defender, ruud Van nistelroy started as a defender. We once played a world cup qaulifier in Abidjan that Mutiu played in the central defence. ITS A COUNTLESS list my friend.

Can you explain why there are no free kick/ set pieces specialists?

When we  have freekicks someone takes them. In the first match the ones Haruna took before the red card  were not bad. But let me ask how many set piece specialist have we produced in our football history as a nation. USA94 and Atlanta 96 teams that we now are proud of did not have  any that I remember. Oh please do not mention okocha. I beg of u.

- Can you explain why they cannot take strikes from distance   

I have seen a few strikes from distance  Ighalo took one in the first match the hit the crossbar ,but my guy in football you do what works for you BARCA as a team does not attack by striking from distance and they are european champs. so?

Can you boldly tell me that this was what you expected. No win in 2 matches?

Definitely not the result I expected, but their response and effort is about what I expect from any SIA1's team. I have never seen a match were a nigerian team is constantly on the offensive and putting the opponent on pressure while playing one man down like they did against venezuela. Lets be truthful here. The results have not been good but thats life. I do not want to talk about officiating.

Can you by all means tell us that there are no better strikers in Nigeria at this moment?

Even if/when we have a world cup winning team, no right thinking person  will give you answer in the affirmative. However aside Christiantus who is a nistelroy-like striker, I think the coaches have been fair in the selection of strikers with the short time to prepare and last minute injuries to christantus, and ODU. Also remember that this is an age grade competetion.

Also remember that siasia's philosophy in coaching is that the player must show willingness and readiness to give his best for the country(which I support 10000%) and not just being talented. When you measure a lot of nigerian players by their readiness to give their all, a lot will fall short.

Would you honestly select Igahlo as your captain?

Ighalo was picked by his team mates  as their leader in an open election.

Can you tell us why Rabiu was on the bench?

Can you tell me what he contributed after he was introduced yesterday? Reports have it that he is not fully fit(injury). A lot of bad tackles can be traced to fitness challenge,the marker stretches a lazy foot out instead of making the run with the opponent. Besides Rabiu was there in the AYC and did not make much difference. In football there is what is called CURRENT FORM, not inate ability not past achievement.

When you are done, tell me why you are comparing us to France. Yes they won the WC and Euro competitions but failed during Korea 2002, but must we emulate bad moments in football?

Mind you, even France you mentioned still dey suffer. They have not played their best since 2002.

Nobody set out to emulate what is bad in football, however sometimes there is a striking semblance to what has happened to some others before.

You are wrong France came back in 2006 and narrowly missed the WC by penalty shoot out in the final.

FBS:
_{*uffff now I feel better. That piece was for FIFA and will be sending it to them. *}

Now to more pressing issues. Siasia damaged his reputation by
1) Selecting the wrong players;
2) Selecting the wrong players;
3) Selecting the wrong players.  

Lets analyse this: In the first match, he played a MF as a defender and it beats me as to why he did this. . .to accomodate Haruna? Why is he even in the team? As the sole freekick taker? Pathetic.
Our defense was shaky to say the least in the first half of our first match, but how do you explain creating 20 chances and not converting a SINGLE ONE!
Even a blind man could see that we had no naturally gifted finisher in our line-up. Whatever happened to Chrisantus and those Agege boyz ? Blimey! they play better soccer.
How can a coach select 22 (abi na 23 sef) players that does not consist of at least 3 skillful strikers/finishers? Do we have wingers sef? No free kick takers? We wasted over 10 set pieces! Oh! I, don't even want to talk about their useless long range shots into stand 490!  
Why was Rabiu on the bench? The lad has vision and his passes are off the shizzle my pizzle!
Players like Osanga, Igahlo (and to imagine he is the captain), Orelesi etc. . .They should not be anywhere close to the FE dressing room not to talk of smelling the jersey.

Siasia failed and same goes to his boys but you will ALL agree with me that we have no better coach that Siasia at this moment in Nigeria. His finest moment was with the class of 2005, question is, can he improve on this?

^{* Boy, do I feel better now?  *}

Nigerians ah I fear una i swear . See analysis  eh.

My friend it is very painful we lost those two matches , yes emotions are high but that should not warrant this kind of analysis. Sometimes in life inputs dont reflect the final outcome. We should see this as one of those times. But sincerely a fair minded person will see that the coaches and the boys have put up a good fight although the results dont reflect that.

That the defense is not too solid is one thing even siasia kept mentioning. Kingsley udoh who I felt should have given the defense some stability has not played competitive football for almost 2 yrs. The NFF Failed to get his(kingsley udoh) travel documents ready in time for the spain trip where the coaches planned to do the final assesment and selection. So what should a serious coach do? pick him ahead of others that were available for selection?

Christiantus was injured and oseni did not report , these are two strikers that would  may be have made some difference but what would you have siasia do?

The strikers that seem to have failed the nation are good strikers any day, find out about the exploits of owauchi in bayelsa united,King osanga is a prominent player for heartland any day, odion ighalo is not bad either or do I talk about gbolahan salami?  Yes things have not clicked but sometimes it happens like that in life. In korea 2002 france with all the stars and a not really bad play could not  score even a single goal.


IT IS CALLED FOOTBALL. IF WE WON THOSE TWO MATCHES NO IN THE WORLD WOULD HAVE ATTRIBUTED IT LUCK BECAUSE ON THE BALANCE OF PLAY WE WERE BETTER.

Everything that can go wrong is really going wrong so I am not even sure of our chances as best losers but lets not be blinded by our pain

Samson Siasia, Nigeria coach:

Today we tried to play our own game right from the start and had a lot of opportunities to score. I don't know how many chances we need to make to score a goal though. It's frustrating to have good strikers and yet not be able to put the ball away. Everyone knows if you don't score then you've got no chance of winning. But that's football, and like life sometimes things just don't work out for you. I'm a little disillusioned even though we still have a chance of going through.



Luis Milla, Spain coach:
It was a very even, keenly contested game. Nigeria made it hard for us by closing us down up front, taking the ball from us and making us run a lot to get it back. That made it a physically tiring game for our lads. They have some good players in midfield and up front, but they're a little bit disorganised at the back and we made the most of that. I want to congratulate my players because they worked hard whenever things got tough for us and they managed to come through.

source:http://www.fifa.com/u20worldcup/matches/round=253217/match=300090227/quotes.html

BlueDiva:
Even if our goal stood,
We for still lose. 2-1

That is a "nursery school" approach of analysing a match. What makes you think the goal would not have given the boys extra impetus to get another goal and win the match?

so bad but we can still qualify. yes mathematically

I see us wearing this spanish team out in the second half. I mean it.

n-guage:
Siasia makes a lot of kneejerk reactions. Like exempting Kingsley Udoh. Maybe Chrisantus was truly injured. But the Kingsley Udoh exemption was brash and not well thought out.

So not arranging travel documents for UDOH before the training tour in spain is now SIASIA'S  fault,abi?

Ibime:
Where did Sia1 find these baboons to come and represent Naija?

Watching their play, you can tell that these boys have very low IQ, both footballing and intellect.

Bloody animals! No fit pass, no fit shoot, just dey do gra gra all over the pitch. Touts!

I do not believe the team is that bad. They only need to concentrate better in front of goal. Once they get one goal things will be better

Thor:
And why would that be a bad thing? Can not be worse than it is now

It definitely will be worse my brother

bibiking1:
wasn't it this dude that prayed for our Super Eagles to win and they drew?

And so?
Did we even deserve a draw in that match? May be it was his prayer that gave us an undeserved draw instead of a loss

@poster

And whats so special about being jews, especially now that the time of gentiles has come?

nice topic. nice read

temmytanny:
i guess he underrated del potro

How would he have underrated a man that took nadal to the cleaners in three straight sets?

My federer will be back. The greatest tennis player ever.

Beaf:
All this serves to confirm the assessment of U.S. military officers, who increasingly have come to believe that the principal obstacle to a resolution of Nigeria's continuing crisis is the Nigerian government itself and that the Nigerian elite is bent on committing suicide by continuing its efforts to hold on to power by military force.[/b]

Daniel Volman is the Director of the African Security Research Project in Washington, DC. He is the author of numerous articles and reports and has been studying U.S. security policy toward Africa and African security issues for more than 30 years.

Before Yar A DUA became president some weak analysts always explained that not having graduates as president and key office holders is the bane of Nigeria. We sheepishly celebrated 2 "scholars" ( PRESIDO and VP). We also read unspent budget in katsina state as a show of prudence in governance.

We now see clearer that western education does not bestow intelligence, infact sometimes it increases stupidity as it now help to explain it.

hmmmmm. well e be like say amodu sabi coach small pass armando