Football Nigeria -- Eagles Etcetera

Nigeria beating Swaziland on Tuesday was anticipated even though Nigeria huffed and puffed through the two-game series in order to unpack a defensive team. What was not anticipated was Coach Oliseh’s bold move to change the team in the midst of a critical series. Also, his decision to suddenly replace three foreign-based players with home based lads. However, Oliseh making those moves made clear his thinking going forward. It also indicated a major shift in his stated positions in the past. Read below: How Oliseh Wants To Play? You cannot play in our attacking line-up if speed is not one of your stronger points            -- Oliseh in July 2015. The quote above obtained from Goal.com indicated Oliseh’s views about characteristics of his attacking players. In previous interviews he made statements that such characteristics should define a Nigerian team, not just attackers. Then in the quote below he praises such characteristics in a N...

Swaziland, with a population of just over a million people, is smaller than the population of several Nigerian cities. Swaziland is ranked 130 compared to Nigeria's 59 rank. Of course, the conclusion is that the Swaziland game should be a walk in the park for the Super Eagles even though Nigeria has never met Swaziland in an international.  However, think again. Just a month ago, Nigeria was unable to overcome the No. 135 ranked Tanzania. More telling was that Tanzania did enough to lament missed opportunities to win the game. Guess what? Swaziland in the last few months has beaten the same Tanzania and stunned Guinea 2-1 in Morocco. Those results represent the strength of this Swazi team, the best the country has ever produced. Of course, all that does not mean that Swaziland is expected to beat Nigeria. However, it does mean that Super Eagles must be aware that this team is capable of an upset, particularly in front of a home crowd at the Somhlolo National Stadium in Lobamba...

Nigeria has dominated the FIFA U17 World Cup but has done very little in the senior World Cup that many, both Nigerians and non-Nigerians, have raised serious questions. Most of these questions revolve around the allegation that Nigeria uses over-age players to win the competition. In this piece, we address these allegations in various ways. To do this in any meaningful way, we begin by describing Nigeria's success under two periods, the pre-MRI and the post-MRI; then we review the MRI test; explain Nigeria's dominance at U17 level; analyze the hypothesized link between U17 performance and World Cup dominance at the highest level; and close by assessing how Nigeria should address some issues. The Past (Pre-MRI Era) For us, the past covers the pre-Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) era. There is little doubt that Nigeria took advantage of lax control in the area of birth certifications to field over age players at the U17 levels during this period. To be sure, it was not ju...