If you ask me, I'd say the Eagles take international games less important than they do at their clubs.
That's the problem with all African players that are playing in Europe in fact. They care a lot about their teams more than their nations. They make less efforts and contacts to avoid injuries.. You can see Salah in Liverpool and with Egypt, you feel like there is two players with the same name. Same for so many players in Nigeria or other nations.
Talking about Nigeria, they will have a game tomorrow against Benin which is third in the group for the moment and Nigeria is expected to win and jump in front of them.
That’s one of the problems African teams have. They lack a sense of patriotism to their country and sometimes may feel as though they are doing the country a favour by playing for them. This is often the case because most of the players have dual citizenship.
isn't it obvious? You don't see the kind of energy and passion they display at there team when they are back to the national team. Maybe during the AFCON, we saw determination from the players and that's what affected the results they got even though they weren't playing that well. Look at Troost ekong for instance, dude is passionate regarding playing for Nigeria and you see how he takes the defence as his primary responsibility and still assist in the attack. In this last match against south Africa, I noticed that lookman wasn't playing like that Atalanta lookman that was damn aggressive. He was casual and missed lot's of chances. Maybe it's because they aren't being treated right by thier national League.
Another problem is that the players lack chemistry. They are not used to playing together and as such they lack a bond with each other. The Super Eagles for example have quality players who are individually top tier but they find it hard to come together and play as a team.
that's another advantage the south African side used against us. Most of them are product of there local leagues and have an understanding of thier kind of play but that's not the case with Nigeria. Most of them don't blend at all which causes them not to read when a certain player is making a particular move and what his intention his from such move. I just hope they win today's match so our hope can come stronger again.