Nigeria’s inability to qualify for a second straight FIFA World Cup has triggered renewed demands for sweeping changes at the Nigeria Football Federation, with several football stakeholders calling on the current leadership to accept responsibility and vacate office ahead of the next electoral cycle, The Punch reports.
Former Super Eagles defender and Atlanta 1996 Olympic gold medallist, Abiodun Obafemi, backed any reform capable of restoring the country’s football fortunes, saying Nigerian football can no longer afford to maintain the status quo.
“Honestly, I agree with any action that will bring good to the football house, even if it is an overhaul. Honestly, we just need a change. We cannot continue to do the same thing and expect different results,” Obafemi said.
“Last World Cup before this, we were not there. If you look at the calibre of players we had, we should be there. Even if it is two teams from Africa, Nigeria should be there. We are number one football nation in Africa, and everyone knows the reason why we are struggling, and whatever measure that will bring us back, we should take it. We are losing the respect that we had, that fear factor most of these nations have when facing us is gone. Whatever will bring back those glory days, I am for it 100 per cent.”
Former Green Eagles captain and 1980 Africa Cup of Nations-winning skipper, Segun Odegbami, also attributed the Super Eagles’ failure to qualify to longstanding administrative shortcomings rather than a shortage of quality players.
“This is a very, very sad situation for us,” Odegbami said.
“There is no reason on earth that Nigeria should not have been one of 10 African countries that went to that World Cup. As Nigerians, we should be one of the top one or two, not outside the top 10. Nobody can justify that. To miss back-to-back World Cups is a sad commentary on the state of our football.”
Odegbami maintained that the nation’s football administrators must bear responsibility for the decline.
“We cannot put the blame at the footsteps of anybody else but the administration that is in charge,” he said.
“As a country, we need to look at that place. That is where the whole issue is. We are doing things that are not right, and we keep repeating them while expecting different results. It cannot happen.”
He further noted that Nigeria’s absence from the ongoing World Cup had dampened enthusiasm among football fans across the country.
“Look at what is going on in the country. The World Cup is going on, there is no energy. We cannot even watch properly, and we are not enjoying it. The Nigerian government must not allow what brought us to this point to continue. They have to do something,” he said.
Demands for accountability have gained further traction following Italy’s decision to restructure its football administration after failing to qualify for a third consecutive World Cup, with top officials stepping down before new leadership was installed to drive a rebuilding process.
The growing dissatisfaction has also spilled onto social media, where many Nigerians have criticised the NFF leadership and called for reforms.
One X user, Alex Wenge, wrote, “Extremely disappointed in Nigeria’s back-to-back failure to qualify for the World Cup. I still cannot point to the exact issues, but our football will most likely decline further if care is not taken. Our football federation is extremely corrupt.”
Another supporter, Insonet Uche, argued that simply expanding the World Cup would not address the country’s football problems, writing, “I will not be surprised if the Super Eagles fail to qualify for the World Cup even if it expands to 64 teams until they start doing the right things.”
“The only people worried about increasing the number of participating nations are those who always qualify. The quality of football has improved globally, and teams once regarded as easy opponents are now causing major upsets.”
However, the Director-General of the National Sports Commission, Bukola Olopade, insisted that any leadership change at the NFF must follow due democratic process and rejected suggestions that the current board should shoulder responsibility for Nigeria’s consecutive World Cup qualification failures.
“I am not going to undemocratically push for a change. Any change must be done democratically,” Olopade said, adding that responsibility for the first missed qualification rested with the previous NFF administration under Amaju Pinnick.
“Apart from not qualifying for the World Cup, how did President Gusau and his board fail Nigeria? We need to be fair to one another. I know I will get a lot of backlash from this. People keep saying they failed to qualify for two World Cups. No, that was Amaju Pinnick, and that consumed him,” he said, while pointing to Nigeria’s performances at the Women’s World Cup and the Africa Cup of Nations under the current board as evidence of progress.
