President of Nigeria Football Federation, Alhaji Ibrahim Musa Gusau has explained that the reduction of the makeup of the technical and administrative crew of the Super Eagles and all other national teams is for easier management and to save cost.
Gusau told Completesports.com exclusively in a chat that the new measures have already taken effect with the slashing of the coaching crew of the national Under-20 team from seven to three adding that the same action will be effected on the Golden Eaglets who will open camp this month.
“We started with Super Eagles by trimming the backroom staff to a manageable number from the over 20 attained in the past during their last friendly in Portugal. This I must confess saved us millions of Naira that should have gone into payment of flight tickets and accommodation, as well as daily allowances and expenditures.
“These measures will also affect the Super Falcons, Falconets, Flamingos and the Olympic Eagles and other age-grade national teams. Henceforth, only four coaches will be attached to each of the national teams, but perhaps, the Super Eagles and Super Falcons getting some preferential treatment as the occasion demands.
“The issue of coaches cut across all national teams including the Super Eagles. We cannot be managing 7-8 coaches in a team. That is an invitation for chaos and it’s money-consuming. To this end, we have told some of the coaches that their services are no longer required while some may be redeployed, ” Gusau stated.
The NFF boss who is in Algeria for the CHAN tournament as one of the officials revealed the pain of Nigeria’s absence from the biennial competition for players who feature in their respective countries’ domestic leagues.
Gusau added: “It is a big miss that Nigeria did not qualify [for CHAN 2023], but we shall work very hard to ensure that we do not miss future tournaments again.”
