Why NFF snub Amunike as Finidi may hire a foreign assistant

Nigeria Football Federation technical committee member, Victor Ikpeba, has revealed the reason behind the soccer house’s decision to employ Finidi George as head coach of the Super Eagles.

Finidi’s appointment was confirmed by the NFF on Monday.

Ikpeba, who was Finidi’s teammate in their playing days in the Super Eagles, stated that the NFF settled for Finidi because of their financial constraints.

“Firstly, I want to congratulate Finidi George on his appointment as the Super Eagles coach. However, it was a difficult task because we (the technical committee) initially wanted a foreign manager,” Ikpeba said on Supersports Monday Night Football.

“However, we settled for Finidi because of the finances. It’s not like we don’t have confidence in our coaches back home. We thought there should be continuity in the way Peseiro took the team to the final of the 2023 AFCON. So, eventually, we were guided by the NFF President to look inward.”

Finidi’s first official game will be Nigeria’s 2026 FIFA World Cup qualifier against Bafana Bafana of South Africa in June. According to Score Nigeria, the NFF snubbed Emmanuel Amuneke Finidi was preferred so that he could continue where Peseiro had stopped having understudied him for over 20 months.

The committee only considered Amuneke an option to Finidi and that may even have been so at the prompting of Sports Minister John Enoh as it did not list the former Barcelona star in its original recommendations of three coaches.

Several top NFF officials were never comfortable working with Amuneke.

They recall a frosty working relationship particularly when he was in charge of the Golden Eaglets in 2015.

Amuneke, one of the officials told SCORENigeria, did not also endear himself to his immediate bosses when it was alleged he instigated a pay strike by the U20 national team, the Flying Eagles, which eventually cost them qualification to the 2017 U20 AFCON.

Two years ago, he was imposed on Augustine Eguavoen by then Sports Minister Sunday Dare and to this day many of the top officials blame him for the failure of the Super Eagles to qualify for the 2022 World Cup in Qatar.

“There is still bad blood between Amuneke and many of these officials,” a source added.

Another official also accused Amuneke of unethical conduct as he was directly involved in the transfer of several of the Golden Eaglets players under him.

News of a court case that caused his Lagos house to be impounded certainly did not help his chances of becoming the next Super Eagles.

Meanwhile, the NFF has shortlisted three coaches for the Super Eagles assistant coaching role.

The coaches are Emmanuel Amuneke, Daniel Amokachi, and Michael Nsien.

Amuneke, who was one of the front runners for the head coach job, once worked as an assistant to Samson Siasia and Augustine Eguavoen.

Former forward Amokachi also once worked as an assistant in the national team.

The 52-year-old worked as assistant to late coaches, Shaibu Amodu and Stephen Keshi.

Nsien, a former U-23 Eagles defender, is currently the head coach of the United States America U-19 team.

But there are insinuations that Finidi may prefer a foreign assistant.

“Finidi will choose his assistants,” a top source informed SCORENigeria

“He wants to work with those who will add real value to what he is doing and, of course, he also wants to work with people who will be loyal and not those who he cannot trust.”

Samson Siasia worked with Dutchman Simon Kalika with remarkable success at the 2005 U20 World Cup and the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

Interestingly, when Finidi led the Super Eagles to beat Ghana in a friendly in Morocco last month, the Black Stars' new coach, Otto Addo, also worked with a foreign assistant.