How to play Kamikazee footy my take!
Posted: Fri Aug 05, 2016 2:59 pm
It was a match everyone with a stake in waited for not sure of what to expect due to the controversy that heralded the Dream team into Rio. In what has become embarrassingly familiar and disgraceful to say the least, the inept people saddled with the responsibility of making simple decisions that should help our athletes and representatives give their best displayed their incompetence again one that can at best be described as criminal. Their actions left the players having to arrive at the venue of their match from Atlanta with just a few hours to spare.
Personally I was torn between two options, I wanted the team to lose, not because I was unpatriotic, but rather because if we win, the criminality that runs in our leadership will continue, those who belittle the importance of adequate preparation and diligence will continue to have somewhere to hide and justifications for their criminal actions. But the other side of me wanted the boys to win, they have sacrificed, they have suffered and at the end of the day it was always going to be to their own glory. I have been in this situation before , not once , not twice, so I know the frustration, the anger and the pains of being sabotaged by those who ought to be helping you to achieve your best.
I left my options open, truth is I am done with blind patriotism, I am done with defending criminality as a nation hoping in the midst of criminality is abetting crime. I made up my mind I was going to support the team by staying up late to watch the match even though I had to be up by 6 am to go to where my own bread is being buttered. The least I could do was to show solidarity with the gallant boys representing the nation while being let down by the criminals who were supposed to be looking after their wellbeing. I was detached going into the match and remain detached all through, getting myself emotionally charged up at 2am was always a dangerous thing .
Let me talk about the match itself doing so by giving my views on what I saw. Perhaps a couple of things I noticed about the team’s set up and approach to the game caught me by surprise. First I was surprise with the pace with which the team started, I was expecting them to be suffering from jetlag and probably be sluggish coming into the game, but that was not the case.
Secondly the team went for an all out offensive formation, even Mikel was pushed upfront(will talk about this more later). The defence pushed up and the fullbacks were flying down both flanks, we were not going to hold back jetlag or not. If the Japanese have been reading about our travelling ordeal, our approach must have caught them offguard. So what was the thinking of the coaches?
I think they went for broke, if you are gonna make it out of this group, you need to take it to teams like Japan (no disrespect), but that is just stating a simple fact. They simply do not have an answer for our athleticism, pace, skill and strength. It was a Kamikazee onslaught on our part, I suspect our coaches are gamblers because that was what they did. I would love to know what they did and how they got the boys to be fresh and ready for this game, they looked sharper than many teams who had time to rest. I have my fears, the jetlag issue and the brouhaha may come in later, but as far as the match against Japan was concerned we looked the part.
Two quick goals that were also quickly cancelled out, all coming within 15 minutes left me wondering how the night was going to pan out. It left me wondering if it was safe to continue to watch a match that had every appearance of being harmful to anyone with high blood pressure. I’d seen enough to encourage me that we could do Japan easily, I’d seen enough within 20 minutes to calm me down, but I also saw how easily Japan came back into the game by equalising our first two goals. Something was terribly wrong with the defensive setup. Some people mentioned fatigue, I beg to differ, it had nothing to do with fatigue, they looked sharp all right, it was just the way they were set up that was wrong. The best explanation I got was that Troost and Seth were probably playing together for the first time and did not have enough time to gel, an essential ingredient in the center of the defence. The play between the two was disjointed, they did not keep their shape or formation at the back. Individually both were okay and did well( things could have been worse if not for this), but as a unit they were horribly bad and this the Japanese team capitalised upon.
The fullbacks were okay going forward, the right back even had an assist with a delightful cross that found Etebo in the box, something very rare in our football these days. Amunzie was also decent going forward , his scorcher forced a save from the Japanese keeper. But defensively they were naïve especially Amunzie at the left back. I watched him first when he played for the SE against Egypt in Kaduna and over the two legs of that encounter, I had to question his defensive instincts. He had no sense of awareness both of his positioning and that of the opponent. Defending is not only about tackling , it is also about how you position yourself to make life difficult for your opponent. It is also about how you position yourself to discourage a pass being made to the man you are marking. It is how your force your opponent to go into a difficult area by refusing to give him the position of advantage he desires, Amunzie for all his potentials lack these qualities. He allows his opponent to choose the juiciest portion of space while he settles for the bones..a no no for a true defender.
Watch the Japanese 4th goal, who allows a left footed player playing on the right to cut in into a free space and then have a free shot at goal? The minute you see a left footed player on the ball on the right side, you know they have only one thing on their mind for them to be dangerous..unless well such can effectively use both legs. Who allows an opponent the luxury of controlling the ball close to the box , turning and the placement of the ball(note I said placement, this requires more time than just shooting of the ball, because more planning and precision is needed). The back four need a lot of work to do, if the team is to go anywhere.
To start with there is a point I need to stress, I love SSS’s brand of attacking football, at the age grade level, it works and it is effective. For starters very few countries can match our pace, skill and strength at that level but as we move on the ladder our lack of discipline come to haunt us, leaving huge gaps all over the place in the name of attacking become a xmas bonus for teams with the ability to punish us and these they would gladly do. Our biggest strength even in attack lies in bursting out from defensive position with the spring of a coiled cobra, in other words we should build on our strength to soak in attack and turn that into our advantage since we would have the space to burst into on the counter. But in yesterday’s game we left huge gaps behind, the center of our defence was porous partly because the two center halves were being split apart as they run into to cover the rampaging full backs.
I don’t know why SSS at this stage still believes Mikel should play as an attacking midfielder, I love people who have convictions and stick to it, but being obstinately stubborn and refusing to face or adjust to reality is equally bad. Mikel has played in the heart of one of the best defensive unit in the world at the highest level, if we cannot utilise that benefit in a team that look disjointed in defence like the Nusra front’s futile attempt to defend Aleppo, then that is the sign of an obstinate coach as opposed to following his convictions. To concede 4 goals while leaving Mikel trying hard to rediscover the ability he last showed as a teenager and some 11 years ago, is carelessness on the part of the coach, truth is for a player of Mikel’s status the role he was made to play limited his contribution. That he had to be taken off tells us that he does not have the lungs for that role especially in a fast paced game. The last thing you want to be doing in a crucial competition is yanking off your captain because he is tired…Mikel looked like a worn Michellin tire by the time he had to come off. He did well but I have seen him play 90 minutes in the role that has come to suit him and where he has been clinically effective in the last decade. Mikel was needed more in that middle, he was needed in front of the defence, his calming influence and his ability to control the pace of the game would have been appreciated more from his favoured DM position rather than succumb to the futile attempt at rediscovering his AM instincts that has since been buried somewhere in Stamford Bridge.
We need to sort out the role of Etebo, thunder fire anyone trying to saddle him with a DM role in order to allow others fill in the slot that rightfully belongs to him. I have heard of people being asked to be given a free role, and my answer to them is simple….do you have the work ethics to justify that luxury, do you have the discipline, integrity and honesty that comes along with it. Many do not, Etebo has it in abundance. The reason he scores goal whether from tap in or not is because he works his socks off to get into position. He is not the neatest on the field but he is one you will see everywhere doing everything to give his team the edge…this is what winners have. Seeing him visibly angry and letting go at his mates after the game confirms my gut feeling about this boy…he is a winner. My first instinct was to compare him to Amokachi whom I play against fresh from secondary school and took the league by storm in 89 with his raw energy. The only difference is, I am yet to see someone who can run with the ball like the bull, but when it comes to charging relentlessly and pushing for position to punish the opposing team Etebo ranks up there.
There is a reason the likes of Lampard, Gerald score goals in abundance even when they are not the neatest of midfielders, they know how to probe for these spaces and when they see it , they are ready to kill to get into those positions. You cannot mark such players, you cannot stop them nor is there any strategy to prevent them from scoring but themselves or a daft coach who decides to put them on a chain in the name of tactics. That was what happened to Etebo against Egypt, especially in the second leg. Etebo is an attacking midfield and on no account should anyone be tempted to play him anywhere else. He is hardworking enough to cover extra grounds, he has the winners mentality to do that, just as he has the eyes for spotting weakness on the opposing side, he also sees danger on his own team and he rushes in to offer help. Etebo for me was the MOM, how anyone could award that title to anyone else remain one of the mysteries of this world. Scoring 4 goals , even if you were snoozing on the pitch would automatically wipe off other candidates…Etebo worked his socks off and his 4 goals were the reward of hard graft.
We looked good in the attack because Japan simply had no answer for us, were it not for the shambolic defending , the match against Japan would have been a rout, a no contest. Most of our threat came from the right, where Imo did a good job in collabo with the right back. This is second time or third I am watching that boy on the right back, I like what I have seen so far, the truth is a number of these boys were rushed ahead of their time into the Egypt match, most of them still need a year or two together to challenge at that level. That boy does what has been lacking on the right side of the SE for decades, a rampaging attacking full back gifted with the ability to deliver a decent cross. I don’t mean the hopes lumping of the ball into a no man’s land, I mean actually locating his mate in the opponent’s box.
The other highlight of the game and the team for me, was Umar Sadiq, my first reaction was ..oh no not another Uchebo pretending to be a Kanu, well Sadiq was not another Uchebo, he had more hustle and more presence than Uchebo. He has tall and was not toppling over like the twin towers hit by planes flown by Alqueda. Naturally tall strikers are prone to this, they tend to be clumsy, except for few like Drogba, Kanu and Yekini. Sadiq has the tool set, he needs to improve on his decision especially when he comes under pressure. He knows how to pressure defenders , but when put under pressure himself his passes go astray. He did well against a Japanese opponent, but I will like to see him against a more disciplined and physically stronger defender. He looks intelligent and appears he has the ability to play and not just lumber around on the pitch. He is surely one to keep an eye on.
Winning by 5 goals is heart-warming, but conceding 4 goals immediately sets off an alarm, especially when it is coming against a team like Japan. I would have taken 5-2, but 4 goals mean something is wrong, something structurally and fundamentally is wrong, the team is not balanced. I remember this team playing in one friendly tournament a couple of months ago, and they were shipping goals like it was now a football fashion….well it appears this is a fashion with this team. Unfortunately conceding 4 goals means one thing….disaster is just around the corner. The most annoying thing about the way the goals came about and yes including the soft penalty was that…they were all avoidable goals. I leave that to the coaches to sort out. One of the coaches on the bench was my close pal and former colleague at Kwasu Bombers , Monday Odigie, he was a defender, his job is well cut out for him. Some people wanted to blame the keeper, sorry guys, all the Japanese goals were legit goals, there was nothing the keeper could do except may be tear his defenders a couple of verbal slaps for defending like ‘kinders’.
The team has started well, and I hope and pray they have been able to banish the ordeal they went through on their way to Rio…the Yoruba proverb……”Igba iponju la nmo akikanju readily comes to mind” (It is in tough times that we recognise brave people), but hey the *kindpeople* running our society to the ground have a way of hiding behind these proverbs, ditto prayers. Let me just say to the boys, do your best, do it for your own honour and for the pride of your family and friends. Give your best using the platform to market yourself and perhaps use the opportunity to make millions of Nigerians going through hard times happy. That is the only thing you owe to yourself, whatever is the outcome of your endeavour, you all are heroes already…you went against odds and once again you defied it. A couple of days ago the world was laughing at us , wondering how we could be such idiots on the global scale…but with your gusty performance you rubbed it in their faces..as far as I am concerned you have won the gold already. May God bless you all!
Personally I was torn between two options, I wanted the team to lose, not because I was unpatriotic, but rather because if we win, the criminality that runs in our leadership will continue, those who belittle the importance of adequate preparation and diligence will continue to have somewhere to hide and justifications for their criminal actions. But the other side of me wanted the boys to win, they have sacrificed, they have suffered and at the end of the day it was always going to be to their own glory. I have been in this situation before , not once , not twice, so I know the frustration, the anger and the pains of being sabotaged by those who ought to be helping you to achieve your best.
I left my options open, truth is I am done with blind patriotism, I am done with defending criminality as a nation hoping in the midst of criminality is abetting crime. I made up my mind I was going to support the team by staying up late to watch the match even though I had to be up by 6 am to go to where my own bread is being buttered. The least I could do was to show solidarity with the gallant boys representing the nation while being let down by the criminals who were supposed to be looking after their wellbeing. I was detached going into the match and remain detached all through, getting myself emotionally charged up at 2am was always a dangerous thing .
Let me talk about the match itself doing so by giving my views on what I saw. Perhaps a couple of things I noticed about the team’s set up and approach to the game caught me by surprise. First I was surprise with the pace with which the team started, I was expecting them to be suffering from jetlag and probably be sluggish coming into the game, but that was not the case.
Secondly the team went for an all out offensive formation, even Mikel was pushed upfront(will talk about this more later). The defence pushed up and the fullbacks were flying down both flanks, we were not going to hold back jetlag or not. If the Japanese have been reading about our travelling ordeal, our approach must have caught them offguard. So what was the thinking of the coaches?
I think they went for broke, if you are gonna make it out of this group, you need to take it to teams like Japan (no disrespect), but that is just stating a simple fact. They simply do not have an answer for our athleticism, pace, skill and strength. It was a Kamikazee onslaught on our part, I suspect our coaches are gamblers because that was what they did. I would love to know what they did and how they got the boys to be fresh and ready for this game, they looked sharper than many teams who had time to rest. I have my fears, the jetlag issue and the brouhaha may come in later, but as far as the match against Japan was concerned we looked the part.
Two quick goals that were also quickly cancelled out, all coming within 15 minutes left me wondering how the night was going to pan out. It left me wondering if it was safe to continue to watch a match that had every appearance of being harmful to anyone with high blood pressure. I’d seen enough to encourage me that we could do Japan easily, I’d seen enough within 20 minutes to calm me down, but I also saw how easily Japan came back into the game by equalising our first two goals. Something was terribly wrong with the defensive setup. Some people mentioned fatigue, I beg to differ, it had nothing to do with fatigue, they looked sharp all right, it was just the way they were set up that was wrong. The best explanation I got was that Troost and Seth were probably playing together for the first time and did not have enough time to gel, an essential ingredient in the center of the defence. The play between the two was disjointed, they did not keep their shape or formation at the back. Individually both were okay and did well( things could have been worse if not for this), but as a unit they were horribly bad and this the Japanese team capitalised upon.
The fullbacks were okay going forward, the right back even had an assist with a delightful cross that found Etebo in the box, something very rare in our football these days. Amunzie was also decent going forward , his scorcher forced a save from the Japanese keeper. But defensively they were naïve especially Amunzie at the left back. I watched him first when he played for the SE against Egypt in Kaduna and over the two legs of that encounter, I had to question his defensive instincts. He had no sense of awareness both of his positioning and that of the opponent. Defending is not only about tackling , it is also about how you position yourself to make life difficult for your opponent. It is also about how you position yourself to discourage a pass being made to the man you are marking. It is how your force your opponent to go into a difficult area by refusing to give him the position of advantage he desires, Amunzie for all his potentials lack these qualities. He allows his opponent to choose the juiciest portion of space while he settles for the bones..a no no for a true defender.
Watch the Japanese 4th goal, who allows a left footed player playing on the right to cut in into a free space and then have a free shot at goal? The minute you see a left footed player on the ball on the right side, you know they have only one thing on their mind for them to be dangerous..unless well such can effectively use both legs. Who allows an opponent the luxury of controlling the ball close to the box , turning and the placement of the ball(note I said placement, this requires more time than just shooting of the ball, because more planning and precision is needed). The back four need a lot of work to do, if the team is to go anywhere.
To start with there is a point I need to stress, I love SSS’s brand of attacking football, at the age grade level, it works and it is effective. For starters very few countries can match our pace, skill and strength at that level but as we move on the ladder our lack of discipline come to haunt us, leaving huge gaps all over the place in the name of attacking become a xmas bonus for teams with the ability to punish us and these they would gladly do. Our biggest strength even in attack lies in bursting out from defensive position with the spring of a coiled cobra, in other words we should build on our strength to soak in attack and turn that into our advantage since we would have the space to burst into on the counter. But in yesterday’s game we left huge gaps behind, the center of our defence was porous partly because the two center halves were being split apart as they run into to cover the rampaging full backs.
I don’t know why SSS at this stage still believes Mikel should play as an attacking midfielder, I love people who have convictions and stick to it, but being obstinately stubborn and refusing to face or adjust to reality is equally bad. Mikel has played in the heart of one of the best defensive unit in the world at the highest level, if we cannot utilise that benefit in a team that look disjointed in defence like the Nusra front’s futile attempt to defend Aleppo, then that is the sign of an obstinate coach as opposed to following his convictions. To concede 4 goals while leaving Mikel trying hard to rediscover the ability he last showed as a teenager and some 11 years ago, is carelessness on the part of the coach, truth is for a player of Mikel’s status the role he was made to play limited his contribution. That he had to be taken off tells us that he does not have the lungs for that role especially in a fast paced game. The last thing you want to be doing in a crucial competition is yanking off your captain because he is tired…Mikel looked like a worn Michellin tire by the time he had to come off. He did well but I have seen him play 90 minutes in the role that has come to suit him and where he has been clinically effective in the last decade. Mikel was needed more in that middle, he was needed in front of the defence, his calming influence and his ability to control the pace of the game would have been appreciated more from his favoured DM position rather than succumb to the futile attempt at rediscovering his AM instincts that has since been buried somewhere in Stamford Bridge.
We need to sort out the role of Etebo, thunder fire anyone trying to saddle him with a DM role in order to allow others fill in the slot that rightfully belongs to him. I have heard of people being asked to be given a free role, and my answer to them is simple….do you have the work ethics to justify that luxury, do you have the discipline, integrity and honesty that comes along with it. Many do not, Etebo has it in abundance. The reason he scores goal whether from tap in or not is because he works his socks off to get into position. He is not the neatest on the field but he is one you will see everywhere doing everything to give his team the edge…this is what winners have. Seeing him visibly angry and letting go at his mates after the game confirms my gut feeling about this boy…he is a winner. My first instinct was to compare him to Amokachi whom I play against fresh from secondary school and took the league by storm in 89 with his raw energy. The only difference is, I am yet to see someone who can run with the ball like the bull, but when it comes to charging relentlessly and pushing for position to punish the opposing team Etebo ranks up there.
There is a reason the likes of Lampard, Gerald score goals in abundance even when they are not the neatest of midfielders, they know how to probe for these spaces and when they see it , they are ready to kill to get into those positions. You cannot mark such players, you cannot stop them nor is there any strategy to prevent them from scoring but themselves or a daft coach who decides to put them on a chain in the name of tactics. That was what happened to Etebo against Egypt, especially in the second leg. Etebo is an attacking midfield and on no account should anyone be tempted to play him anywhere else. He is hardworking enough to cover extra grounds, he has the winners mentality to do that, just as he has the eyes for spotting weakness on the opposing side, he also sees danger on his own team and he rushes in to offer help. Etebo for me was the MOM, how anyone could award that title to anyone else remain one of the mysteries of this world. Scoring 4 goals , even if you were snoozing on the pitch would automatically wipe off other candidates…Etebo worked his socks off and his 4 goals were the reward of hard graft.
We looked good in the attack because Japan simply had no answer for us, were it not for the shambolic defending , the match against Japan would have been a rout, a no contest. Most of our threat came from the right, where Imo did a good job in collabo with the right back. This is second time or third I am watching that boy on the right back, I like what I have seen so far, the truth is a number of these boys were rushed ahead of their time into the Egypt match, most of them still need a year or two together to challenge at that level. That boy does what has been lacking on the right side of the SE for decades, a rampaging attacking full back gifted with the ability to deliver a decent cross. I don’t mean the hopes lumping of the ball into a no man’s land, I mean actually locating his mate in the opponent’s box.
The other highlight of the game and the team for me, was Umar Sadiq, my first reaction was ..oh no not another Uchebo pretending to be a Kanu, well Sadiq was not another Uchebo, he had more hustle and more presence than Uchebo. He has tall and was not toppling over like the twin towers hit by planes flown by Alqueda. Naturally tall strikers are prone to this, they tend to be clumsy, except for few like Drogba, Kanu and Yekini. Sadiq has the tool set, he needs to improve on his decision especially when he comes under pressure. He knows how to pressure defenders , but when put under pressure himself his passes go astray. He did well against a Japanese opponent, but I will like to see him against a more disciplined and physically stronger defender. He looks intelligent and appears he has the ability to play and not just lumber around on the pitch. He is surely one to keep an eye on.
Winning by 5 goals is heart-warming, but conceding 4 goals immediately sets off an alarm, especially when it is coming against a team like Japan. I would have taken 5-2, but 4 goals mean something is wrong, something structurally and fundamentally is wrong, the team is not balanced. I remember this team playing in one friendly tournament a couple of months ago, and they were shipping goals like it was now a football fashion….well it appears this is a fashion with this team. Unfortunately conceding 4 goals means one thing….disaster is just around the corner. The most annoying thing about the way the goals came about and yes including the soft penalty was that…they were all avoidable goals. I leave that to the coaches to sort out. One of the coaches on the bench was my close pal and former colleague at Kwasu Bombers , Monday Odigie, he was a defender, his job is well cut out for him. Some people wanted to blame the keeper, sorry guys, all the Japanese goals were legit goals, there was nothing the keeper could do except may be tear his defenders a couple of verbal slaps for defending like ‘kinders’.
The team has started well, and I hope and pray they have been able to banish the ordeal they went through on their way to Rio…the Yoruba proverb……”Igba iponju la nmo akikanju readily comes to mind” (It is in tough times that we recognise brave people), but hey the *kindpeople* running our society to the ground have a way of hiding behind these proverbs, ditto prayers. Let me just say to the boys, do your best, do it for your own honour and for the pride of your family and friends. Give your best using the platform to market yourself and perhaps use the opportunity to make millions of Nigerians going through hard times happy. That is the only thing you owe to yourself, whatever is the outcome of your endeavour, you all are heroes already…you went against odds and once again you defied it. A couple of days ago the world was laughing at us , wondering how we could be such idiots on the global scale…but with your gusty performance you rubbed it in their faces..as far as I am concerned you have won the gold already. May God bless you all!
, I am tired of YUJAM always rushing into head-on collisions with his comments! 