The most successful U-17 male national football team in the world, the Golden Eaglets of Nigeria, on Tuesday September 30, presented an unwanted 65th Independence Day celebration gift to the country when they failed to qualify for the 2025 AFCON Championship.
The five-time world champions were beaten 2-1 by Ghana in the second semi-final of the WAFU-B Championship, which also serves as qualifiers for the U-17 AFCON. The host country, Cote d’Ivoire, had defeated Burkina Faso 2-1 in the first semi-final match. Therefore, both the Baby Elephants and the Black Starlets will represent WAFU-B at the continental showpiece where 10 teams would qualify for Qatar 2026 World Cup.
Following the pre-Independence mishap in Cote d’Ivoire, the Golden Eaglets have now failed twice in a row to qualify for the World Championship, a testament to the sharp decline in the fortunes of the cadet national team. Nigeria’s last appearance at the FIFA U-17 World Cup was in 2019 in Brazil, but the team failed to go beyond the round of 16.
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In Brazil, the Coach Manu Garba led Eaglets topped their group but fell 1-3 to the Netherlands in the Round of 16. The 2021 edition was cancelled due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, which altered many human activities, but the World Championship returned in 2023 without the Golden Eaglets. Nigeria missed out of the party because the Nduka Ugbade squad had failed to reach the semi-finals at the 2023 AFCON. They ended their campaign at the quarter-final stage after losing 1-2 to Burkina Faso, the same team they had beaten by the same margin in the final of the WAFU B championship in Ghana. The failure to qualify for Indonesia 2023 led to the sack of Ugbade and other members of the technical crew.
After giving Ugbade the boot, the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF), with a penchant for recycling failed coaches, brought back Manu Garba to continue from where he stopped in 2019. The appointment of the former World Cup winner was greeted with condemnation from most Nigerians who wanted a new generation football coach to be assigned the responsibility of discovering future Super Eagles.
Those who opposed the return of Manu Garba did so not out of hatred for the Member of the Order of the Niger (MON) but because of their conviction that as long as the older generation of coaches are preferred to the emerging managers who have already proven their mettle with youth teams in the country, we shall continue to run in circles. Sadly, this is happening already as the once flourishing Golden Eaglets are no longer good enough to even qualify for the AFCON U-17 Championship.
Personally, I have so much respect for Coach Garba because of the meritorious services he has rendered to the nation in his active days as a player and now as a coach. As we all know, the 59-year-old Gombe State born football tactician is a proud winner of the FIFA U-17 World Cup in 2013 and the prestigious AFCON U-20 title in 2015. He is also credited with discovering and nurturing Super Eagles stars like Kelechi Iheanacho, Taiwo Awoniyi, Kelechi Nwakali, Isaac Success, Musa Mohammed, Musa Yahaya, etc.
However, nothing lasts forever. Just as we have tired legs, we also have tired brains. So, many are of the opinion that now is the time for Garba to honourably leave the stage because soon Nigerians would forget that he once gave them joyous moments. After all, it is said that a coach is as good as his last match. And what is Garba’s last match? It is the failure to qualify his team for the next FIFA U-17 World Cup in Qatar.
It may be argued that he is still a good coach, but between 2013 and now, a lot of water has passed under the bridge. It is either his hunger for results has diminished or he has consciously surrendered his team selection to greedy football agents. In fact, I was shocked when a known football agent in Nigeria wrote on behalf of Garba to invite players for screening in Uyo. You heard me right: a football agent invited players for screening on behalf of the coach. Therefore, the end result didn’t come to me as a surprise.
But soon after the Eaglets crashed out of the WAFU-B Championship on Tuesday, the coach who spoke during a press conference blamed his team’s failure on the “imbalance” in the allocation of slots to the football zones in Africa. He said it was unfair for the Confederation of African Football (CAF) to allocate only two slots to WAFU-B, which, according to him, is housing the continent’s most formidable and successful cadet national teams.
It will be recalled that in CAF’s allocation of slots for the U-17 AFCON, WAFU-A with eight countries have three slots; WAFU-B with seven countries have two; North Africa Zone with five countries have three slots; the Central Zone with eight countries have two; East Zone with 10 countries have three slots while the South Zone with 12 countries have three, making a total of 16 teams for the continental tournament.
Coach Garba, therefore, is advocating that one more slot be allocated to WAFU-B comprising Nigeria, Ghana, Cote d’Ivoire, Burkina Faso, Niger Republic, Togo, and Benin Republic. His argument is that going by the present arrangement, CAF is denying the continent of credible representation at the World Cup. The embattled coach has a valid point because Nigeria, Ghana, Cote d’Ivoire, and Burkina Faso have the potential to perform on the world’s biggest stage at any given opportunity. Unfortunately, if the current “evil route’ to the AFCON U-17 is maintained, every year, the world would be denied the opportunity of watching some of the prodigious talents from Africa because two out of the four heavyweights must drop out.
Even as I fully support Garba’s call for CAF to increase the slots for WAFU-B from two to at least three, I still insist that he has failed the country again. Considering Nigeria’s pedigree as the most successful team in the world cadet championship and the talents that abound in the country, we shouldn’t beg for more slots for us to qualify for the AFCON. In Cote d’Ivoire, two tickets were at stake, yet the Eaglets failed to pick one. Where is the guarantee that if the slots are eventually increased, we would easily clinch one?
Well, instead of crying over spilt milk, let us demand positive changes from the concerned authorities. The NFF should find a young and knowledgeable coach like Olumide Ajibolade of Beyond Limits to replace Manu Garba. Apart from Ajibolade, there are so many other new generation coaches who can make a difference. Coach Garba, too, should know that he is gradually becoming a serial failure, which is not good for his reputation. Therefore, he shouldn’t hesitate to hand over the baton to a younger colleague when asked to do so.
We have to act fast because as we continue to toy around with our youth national teams, we are inevitably laying the foundation for more future catastrophes in football. It is, indeed, worrisome that Nigeria is no longer developing future Super Eagles players. Instead of going forward, we are consistently running backwards.
