LAGOS
Many Nigerian football enthusiasts blamed Coach Stephen Keshi for the Super Eagles' disappointing goalless draw with Iran in their World Cup opener late Monday.
"I think the coach got his calculations wrong," Kashimawo Laloko, former technical director for the Nigeria Football Federation, told Anadolu Agency on Tuesday.
"We needed to play our best attackers against the Iranians," he said. "But we didn't play as if we needed these three points."
Despite having led in ball possession at 63 percent, the Nigerian national squad failed to secure a single goal against Iran in Monday's World Cup opener.
Both sides performed poorly throughout the game, which was rife with miscued shots and poorly-executed crosses.
The stalemate marked the 2014 FIFA World Cup's first goalless match.
"Suffice it to say that I was disappointed," said Laloko.
The Super Eagles – as the Nigerian national squad is fondly referred to – are playing in Group F, along with Argentina, Iran and Bosnia-Herzegovina.
Only two of the four teams will advance to the second round of the month-long tournament.
Nigeria, Africa's current football champions, are making their fifth appearance at the quadrennial tournament. The first time was in 1994, when they were edged out in the second round.
-Spoiled-
Oladotun Adedo, a local football enthusiast, said the match had spoiled his night.
"Nothing is more painful than to find yourself going out in the chilling hours of the night, only to be served with such an ugly dish called a match," he told AA.
"It rained throughout yesterday, but I still went out to watch the game," Adedo fumed.
But Qamardeen Aleshinloye, a diehard fan from Ibadan, capital of Nigeria's southwestern Oyo State, likewise blamed the coach for the team's uninspiring performance.
"I believe we could have done better had the coach got the selection right from the beginning," he told AA by phone.
"Osaze Odemwingie, a very aggressive striker and playmaker, should have started that match," said Aleshinloye.
"This is a big worry for me," he added. "The match against Iran quickly exposed our obvious weakness, which is the lack of a reliable and very skillful playmaker."
For others, the failure of the African champions to win their first match is indicative of a tough road ahead.
"We must win the next match if we want to forge ahead in the competition," Nigerian football analyst Oni Olaoshebikan told AA.
"We could have used Iran as a launch-pad to assert our place in the competition," he said.
"The goalless draw means our chance of moving up in the competition has become very slim," he added.
Olaoshebikan went on to warn that the Bosnian team – Nigeria's next opponent in the group stage – should not be underestimated.
"You needed to watch their [Bosnia's] match against Argentina to understand what I am saying," he said.
On Monday, Bosnia lost 1-2 to Latin American powerhouse Argentina, the two-time World Cup titleholders.
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