NFF, Rohr At “War” Over Inclusion Of Leon Balogun On Eagles List Against Liberia, Cape Verde
By Amaechi Agbo
All is not well within the Nigeria Football Federation, NFF and its employee, Gernot Rohr, Super Eagles coach as the two parties are in heated disagreement over the inclusion of Leon Balogun in the expected list of invited players for the 2022 World Cup qualifying matches against Liberia and Cape Verde next week, www.bestchoicesports.com.ng can report.
According to unamed source, NFF is insisting Gernot Rohr must excuse Leon Balogun from the team but the coach and senior members of the team disagreed and stood for Balogun.
The list which was to be released on Monday, has been delayed over the dissection.
NFF are furious that the Rangers of Scotland defender should be excluded from the team as punishment for criticising the federation on radio last month as well as exposing to the global football community that the Super Eagles are being owed months of match bonuses.
Another reason the list is delayed with less than two weeks to the first match is the fact that NFF and Rohr are aware of the EPL decision on the Covid-19 red-list country by British Government in which Cape Verde was captured and their decision not to release players in the Premiership for the international break.
Rohr’s trusted armies, Kelechi Iheancho, Wilfred Ndịdị, William Troost-Ekong, Alex Iwobi, Peter Etebo, Emmanuel Dennis, Frank Onyeka are all expected to miss the matches in view of the premier league decision.
Gernot Rohr who clocked five years as Super Eagles coach on August 9 this year is expected to arrive in Nigeria on Thursday to begin preparation for the matches with about 10 key players expected to miss the clashes.
It is reported that the NFF doesn’t have a solution for now concerning the “unavailability” of these players, hence the logjam.
Nigeria will take on Liberia on September 3rd next week at the Teslim Balogun Stadium, Lagos and then battle Cape Verde
September 7thin Praia away.
The camp is expected to open this Sunday in Lagos. while the team is expected to depart for Praia via Lagos on September 6th for the return leg
