By Victor Kanayo
Strong indications emerged on Wednesday that the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) will most likely appoint and unveil a new coach for Super Eagles in April.
Heritage Times (HT) reports that the country’s senior men national team have been without a substantive head coach since after the 2023 Africa Cup of Nations when the contract between NFF and former coach Jose Peseiro ended.
Already, many coaches from within and outside Nigeria have been applying for the vacant coaching job since about a week ago when the Football Federation announced it.
As at the time of filling this report, a technical official at the headquarters of the NFF in Abuja told Heritage Times (HT) that up to 20 coaches beat the deadline for submission of the mandatory application letters.
He said, “Among the applications received by the NFF are those from former head coach of Tanzania senior men’s team, Taifa Stars and ex-coach of 2015 FIFA U-17 World Cup winning team, Golden Eaglets of Nigeria, Emmanuel Amuneke, Finidi George who was Peseiro’s assistant coach and former Super Eagles head coach Sunday Oliseh.
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“Others who filed their applications before the deadline are, Samson Siasia, former Super Eagles head coach whose FIFA ban will soon be lifted and Sylvanus Okpala, ex-Super Eagles assistant coach under late Stephen Keshi and Michael Nsien, ex- USA U-16 team coach of Nigerian descent, Super Eagles goalkeeper, Ndubuisi Egbo who is first Nigerian coach to win a league in Europe in 2019/20 season in Albania and former Indomitable Lions of Cameroon coach, Antonio Conceicao.”
The inside source also revealed that the committee of NFF intends to recommend that anyone who will be later appointed to do the job will be allowed to pick his assistants.
Nigeria will later in March confront Mali and Ghana at Stade de Marrakech, Morocco, in international friendly ties.
However, the 2026 World Cup qualifiers will resume in June. Before then, a substantive coach would have been appointed for Super Eagles.
