As many as five seasons has been given as the possible reasons why the senior national team of Nigeria were beaten 0-2 by Guinea in their last warm up game ahead of their participation at the Africa Cup of Nations.
A member of the team in a chat with OwnGoalNigeria.com narrowed the defeat to five key things, which he also say the coach must address before they go to the tournament which begins on the 13th of January. Nigeria’s first game will be on the 14th of January against Equatorial Guinea.
Below are the reason he gave.
1. Unfamiliar Formation – The team has never played in that way before. A session was held but most of the players who were in that team that trained to play this way weren’t in the starting lineup. 3-4-3 isn’t a system you experiment with, it has to be perfected on the training ground.
2. Uncoordinated Back Three – You need to see the first goal to understand this point better. It was a ball over the top that caught the back three of Chidozie Awaziem, William Troost-Ekong and Kenneth Omeruo napping. Not entirely their fault because all three of them are in that role for the first time as a unit. The lack of understanding and coordination proved costly.
3. Wastefulness – Many people will look at the missed spot kick and rightly so but we were wasteful in general. Chances came and gone and we didn’t take any while they had just four attempts and converted two.
4. Debutant In Midfield – How can you explain playing Alhassan Yusuf with Raphael Onyedika. It was the debut for Yusuf and he was paired with Onyedika, another one with little experience. They were over ran and it proved costly.
5. Late substitutions – If the lineup for such a game was funny then the timing of the substitution was even worse. Maybe we could have rescued something from the game if it was made a little earlier.
Mohammed Mowiz Suleiman
