Football Nigeria -- Eagles Etcetera

Recent reports indicate that Nigeria plans to play two international friendlies before a key Nations Cup qualifier against Egypt next March. Quite often Nigeria, as well as other nations, seek to play international friendlies before a competitive game. The idea is that an international friendly prepares the team for the more important competitive game that follows. However, Nigeria does not always play international friendlies just before participating in a competitive game. This makes one wonder whether or not it makes a difference playing international friendlies before a competitive game. This article explores the question of whether international friendlies before a competitive game makes a difference in the outcome of the competitive game. Method While we will not depend on an ultra scientific test to measure effects of international friendlies on the results of competitive games for Nigeria's Super Eagles, we will in this piece look at a few data. We will inves...

One major question about the Super Eagles under Sunday Oliseh is as follows: Is the team improving or not? Ultimately, that question will be answered by how much progress the team makes in its attempt to qualify for both the 2017 Cup for African Nations (CAN) and the 2018 World Cup. However, we can at least take a look at one area that improvement now appears obvious. That area is in conversion of set pieces. In an earlier article , we discussed Nigeria v opponents' set-piece successes at the CAN and the World Cup. This article is different. It looks at the set-piece data under Coach Oliseh and compares it to similar data, at the same point of development, for the Super Eagles under Adegboye Onigbinde, Christian Chukwu, Augustine Eguavoen, Berti Vogts, Shuaibu Amodu, Lars Lagerback, Samson Siasia, and Stephen Keshi. In essence, it is a comparison of Nigerian coaches since 2002. We wanted to look at the last 15 years but that would have involved covering one coach over two peri...