Super Eagles coach, Stephen Keshi
Super
Eagles coach, Stephen Keshi, has highlighted the importance of
motivation to players as he argued that hiring foreign coaches would add
little or nothing to African teams.
Keshi, who featured in the symposium for
the analysis of the 2012 and 2013 Africa Cup of Nations finals in
Cairo, Egypt, said the domestic league players are on the same level of
development as the abroad based ones.
The former Nigeria captain was highly
criticised during the 2013 AFCON in South Africa when he said foreign
coaches were not better than African coaches.
“The football federations need to
believe in African coaches by giving us the chance. If there’s no
opportunity for the coaches, there is no way to know if they are good or
not,” he said at the symposium.
Keshi told the audience that in
Nigeria’s game against Ivory Coast during their quarter-final clash, one
of Nigeria players said “Keshi will kill us” after Cheick Tiote
equalised for Ivory Coast in the 49th minute.
“But I told the players, ‘enjoy
football, and do your best even if you lose.’ They went on ahead to win;
this is the importance of players’ motivation in football,” he was
quoted as saying on CAF website.
Keshi, who became the second man to win
the Nations Cup as a player in 1994 and later as a coach 19 years later,
assured Nigerians that the Super Eagles will make Africa proud at the
FIFA Confederation Cup in Brazil next month.
“We’ll do our best there to give a good image for African football,” he said.
Nigeria are in Group B alongside world champions Spain, Mexico and Tahiti.
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