NIGERIA: Keshi Rejects New NFF Offer

Super Eagles coach Stephen Keshi, has refused to accept an offer of a foreign assistant ahead of the World Cup in Brazil this June. The Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) had met with the ‘Big Boss’ as he is fondly called and proposed a foreign assistant to him which he turned down.

The NFF even proposed to Keshi to pick any foreign assistant of his choice and it will foot the expenses including the salaries. Instead the current African coach of the year, demanded that the FA reinstate one of his former assistants and former teammates, Sylvanus Okpala, who was sacked after the Super Eagles won the 2013 Africa Cup of Nations in South Africa.


Spokesman of the NFF Technical Committee, Paul Bassey, disclosed this on a television programme on Wednesday

“Stephen Keshi was offered the chance to choose a foreign assistant, who will work under him but he made it clear he was fine with his current assistants and backroom staff. The federation did this because they felt Keshi needed additional assistant.

“But Keshi said he wanted one of his assistants, Sylvanus Okpala, to be recalled. The federation told him Okpala can’t be recalled because he was sacked for insubordination.”

The Super Eagles handler is currently working with former teammates Daniel Amokachi, Ike Shorunmu and Togolese, Valere Houandinou as his assistants.