Once the pride of the country as well as the whole of Africa, Nigeria’s age-grade teams are now in more serious danger of posting more disappointing results no thanks to poor preparations and the continued withdrawal of incentives meant for them.
A special report by SCORENigeria has uncovered that the NFF now plan to scrap the qualification bonus promised these age-grade teams after they are no longer entitled to match bonuses.
A top official told SCORENigeria: “The NFF only plan to pay the Flying Eagles for example their outstanding daily allowances over four years and so doing not pay the team what was promised them as qualification bonus for major tournaments.
“This means that the NFF have succeeded in withdrawing more incentives for these teams.
“This can only kill the teams.”
Investigations showed that two classes of the Flying Eagles have yet to be paid qualification bonuses.
In both instances, the team were due $5,000 each for going past the WAFU B qualifiers and another $5,000 for qualifying from the U20 AFCON to the U20 World Cup.
While the Flying Eagles in the last four years have qualified all the way to their version of the World Cup, the Golden Eaglets, no thanks to poor preparation and motivation, have failed to do likewise.
The other major consequence of this neglect is that players from these teams have struggled to transit to higher levels of international football.
And in the meantime, the top coaching positions of both teams remain vacant and preparations for their next campaigns hang in the balance.
