Micheal Obasi
The Race for who gets the New Super Eagles job has now been narrowed down to two names , Frenchman Eric Chelle and Belgian coach Tom Saintfiet, and it will be very interesting to see who gets the job.
However for the quality of the current Super Eagles team , especially the array of attacking players in the team , Nigeria surely needs a coach whose Football style best suits the Super Eagles strength.
And going by the profile and statistics of both Chelle and Saintfiet, the Frenchman profile seems to suit the Eagles better with his staggering attacking stats.
Being in charge of the Malian National team which lasted for two years , Chelle won fourteen matches , drew five and lost just three in 22 matches.
It will be recall that among his victories was the 2-0 win over the Super Eagles in a friendly in March in Morocco under Finidi George.
He further buttressed his exciting attacking style of football with his team scoring 36 goals and let in only 12 goals.
And this stats only showed how the Super Eagles will thrive very well under him if he gets the job because of Nigeria’s better attacking qualities.
Under Former Coach Jose Peseiro , many Nigerians expressed disappointment with how the Portuguese could not get the team to be very prolific In front of goals, even with attackers like Victor Osimhen, Victor Boniface, Sadiq Umar, Paul Onuachu and Terem Moffi.
And it’s no rocket science that the strength of the present Eagles team is the attack-line and getting another Coach who does not have an impressive attacking history is likely to be counterproductive and further erase Nigeria’s slim chance of qualifying for the 2026 World Cup.
As experienced as Tom Saintfiet is on the African continent , his recent records is nothing close to a man that deserves to be the Super Eagles next gaffer.
He has lost all seven matches played with the Philippines National team, four of which are World Cup qualifiers.
The reason why his recent record is even more worrisome and totally negates the profile that is best ideal for the Super Eagles is the fact that his Filipino National team has yet to score a single goal and has conceded eighteen goals .
I am personally a big fan of Tom Saintfiet but I think for the now Eric Chelle has a better profile to lead Nigeria forward.
Micheal Obasi is a Sports Analyst, he writes from Abuja
