Former Super Eagles coach laments over poor pay

Samson Siasia, the former Super Eagles captain and coach, has lamented the inequality between local and foreign coaches, stated that the Nigeria Football Federation obliged to the white coaches ahead of their Nigerian counterparts.

Siasia stated this statement during a podcast with ex-international Emmanuel Babayaro and journalist Matthew Edafe on Saturday.

The NFF is currently in search of a new coach for the Eagles following the exit of Portuguese Jose Peseiro, who guided the team to a second-place finish at the AFCON tournament in Ivory Coast.

“They didn’t give me Super Eagles from the beginning and give me four years.

“They didn’t give Nigeria people four years, you lose one match, they fire you. That’s the truth. The white people will come, you give them more time, you pay them more money.”

Buttressing Babayaro’s point that a white coach once got better pay and was sent on a coaching course by the NFF after losing a game, Siasia added, “And we (local coaches), they won’t send us anywhere and they want us to be better.

“They will pay the white man $50,000 monthly, and pay local hires N1m. From the N1m, the coaching staff will also take inside, and you also have to feed your family.”

He, however, claimed that among all the national teams in Nigeria, the senior men’s team was the easiest to coach, saying the coaches often enjoyed more benefits from the NFF.

“Trust me the easiest team to coach (in Nigeria) is the Super Eagles because they will give you everything that you need,” he said.

“But U-20, U-23 and the U-16 are even worse because you won’t see food to eat. The U-20 is a big problem because if you don’t know people who can help you, you are in trouble. After all, the truth is if you don’t start on time there is no way you can qualify for a tournament.

“All those times that I qualified for tournaments are not a joke, I know people that own hotels. I will go to them and beg them to allow us to lodge and that we will pay later. They will give you a job one month to play a game and you want to screen players and select the best. How do you do that?”

The 1994 AFCON winner as a player added, “We have to go and look for accommodation because they will put us in Goal Project where there is nothing. Do you know how these people (NFF) deal with the national team coaches? That is why most of them cannot qualify because if you don’t have a name you cannot go to the hotel owners to keep rooms for you for free.

“I qualified the country for the Olympics twice, how many other coaches have been able to do that?”

Famed for his entertaining brand of football, Siasia is one of the most successful local coaches in Nigerian football history.

With the exception of the U-17 side that he didn’t manage, Siasia has taken charge of the other men’s teams with relative success.

He won Olympic silver and bronze medals while in charge of the U-23 team in 2008 and 2016 respectively, While in charge of the U-20 side, Siasia won the African Youth Championship in 2005, leading same side to the final of the 2005 U-20 World Cup in The Netherlands.

As a head coach of the Eagles for a year in 2010, the 56-year-old was reappointed in 2016.