The failed attempt by the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) to hire German coach Bruno Labbadia as the coach of the senior national team of Nigeria ahead of their qualifiers have been termed as a blessing in disguise, OwnGoalNigeria.com reports.
Labbadia was announced by the NFF as the new coach of the senior national team of Nigeria, but a few days after the announcement talks broke down following a disagreement over the payment of his taxes.
It left the NFF with no choice but to appoint the technical director of the football house Austine Eguavoen as interim coach for the AFCON qualifiers games against Benin Republic and Rwanda on the 7th and 10th of September respectively.
Eguavoen’s appointment has been termed as a blessing in disguise by one of the stars of the team at the last AFCON Moses Simon, while looking ahead of Saturday’s game against Benin Republic in Uyo.
” The mood is already up because coach Eguavoen already has knowledge of all of the players. He knows the role everybody has to play and he gives confident to the players, but we don’t the foreign coach (Labbadia), we don’t know his tactics , we don’t how it will work because you could have the best player sitting on the bench but I think with Eguavoen he knows everything about us”, Simon told the official channel of the NFF while speaking on the game and the botched attempt to hire Labbadia.
” He ( Eguavoen) knows what is going on in the nation and also in the team because he wasn’t out of the team when he wasn’t the coach anymore. He works with the NFF so he is always within the team, and this is our job and we know what it takes.
” Of course we lost against them 2-1 and this time around we don’t want to lose or draw against them . I think we always beat them and the guys know what they have to do to win”.
