Golden Eaglets need technical assistance, says Izilien

Former Super Falcons coach, Godwin Izilien, has called on the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) to draft in experienced coaches to assist Golden Eaglets manager, Emmanuel Amuneke, in his preparations for the forthcoming FIFA Chile 2015 U-17 World Cup.

The move, he said, was to avoid a repeat of the disaster that befell the Flying Eagles and Super Falcons’ outings at the just concluded FIFA U-20 World Cup in New Zealand and the ongoing Women World Cup in Canada respectively.

Izilien told The Guardian yesterday that the predicament of Nigerian national teams in international championships in recent times was because the NFF had not fashioned out a good technical department that would assist national team coaches in important championships.

He stated that in modern day football a coach needs to get enough technical support to attain success at any level, adding that getting coaches to work with the former Barcelona player should not be seen as a ploy to undermine him.

“Nigerian coaches like handling their teams alone without outside technical assistance because they want to take the glory alone. In modern day football, it does not work like that. A coach needs to get quality technical assistance to excel and I believe the NFF should get technical assistance for the Eaglets. If this is not done, the U-17 team could perform worse than the Falcons and U-20 team,” Izilien said.