Formerly, I used to hear this for the Super Eagles players—that players were being promised rewards as an incentive to win important games like this. What happened to those times?
Has the economy become that bad?
I know normally those are supposed to be a form encouragement for the player to put in efforts and try and win the game by every means possible and I know it is really a good thing to do but I don’t think the players should always be waiting for such promises to be able to give their best in important games like this. They need no one to tell them the matches that are important and it will be a big slap on their face if they don’t later qualify for the World Cup tournament again so even without any promises they should be able to know how important this game is.
I don’t think the economy has become that bad, it could just be that the new government doesn’t have much regard for the sport.
Definitely it has something to do with the coach because these players have been playing for the past competitions and have struggled to maintain that consistency. In the game against Rwanda they showed great character and precision which in my opinion is the effect of the new coach. When you bring in a serious coach the players will have no other option than to be serious because they fear being left out of the team for lack of focus and unseriousness.
I also noticed the difference in character among the players, it was completely different from how it used to be with past coaches in charge. I just hope this isn’t just in one game, I hope they can keep showing such positive energy energy and bring back the good feelings we used to have when watching Super Eagles play. With the new coach I now believe winning Zimbabwe would not be much of a problem.