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| Snatching Defeat They had the chance to secure the services of arguably the greatest coach in African history – the list is short as only the great Charles Kumi Gyamfi can rival Hassan Shehata – but somehow the Nigerian Football Federation managed to mess it up. They summoned Sheata to an interview, which was seen as an insult and after telling him he could have his own assistants, they hired former Sweden coach, Lars Lagerbäck, meaning yet more horrible football and yet again it was unsuccessful as well. Lagerbäck failed to take Sweden to the World Cup despite play-off opportunities denied to Shehata. Quite why the NFF thought he was the solution remains one of football's mysteries. Lagerbäck was offered a long-term contract, but that was rescinded after a pathetic showing in Africa's World Cup. While so-called pundits slammed African football in South Africa, it is amazing how few pointed out that that the African Mentality had played a part. South Africa's preparations were wrecked in advance as while it needed foreign expertise, the South African FA kept losing patience and wasting the preparation time. Lessons Ignored Sven-Gorän Eriksson got the job with la Côte d'Ivoire, succeeding Vahid Halilhodžić, now coaching Dinamo Zagreb. It was a disaster, and one of the few times I agree that a European coach was what was required for an African team. Milovan Rajevac is another who proved me wrong with Ghana, but both are gone now and such policies should only be employed if liked to a development plan to groom the next generation of Africans to take over. That didn't happen. Political interference followed. The Ivorians had only recently emerged from a vicious civil war. The dictatorial Robert Guéï imprisoned under-performing players before losing an election that sparked the civil war. Guéï was the first casualty. Eventually football, especially Chelsea's Didier Drogba, played a huge role in ending the war, but their work is in danger of being undermined thoroughly by yet another selfish politician. Laurent Gbagbo refuses to accept that he was defeated in the election, despite the verdict of international observers. Violence followed. The African mentality has harmed the development of African coaching, but their Federations haven't helped. Lars Lagerbäck and Sven-Gorän Eriksson continued the discredited philosophy that wasted fortunes and yielded yet more humiliating defeats. Will they ever learn? |
