•Sports Minister summons Portuguese coach
Super Eagles coach, Jose Peseiro, told the Nigeria Football Federation Technical Committee not to teach him his job but rather pay him and his team their outstanding allowances, PUNCH Sports Extra reports.
Peseiro allegedly said this while reacting to the NFF Technical Committee Chairman, Shariff Ahlan’s comment in the wake of his future as Eagles coach, stating that the Eagles job is bigger than the Portuguese.
Ahlan told Peseiro in a meeting in Lisbon, Portugal in October that the Eagles had been struggling due to his poor technical abilities.
“You’re busy to pay me my allowances but not busy to tell me what I will do,” Peseiro replied Ahlan when he was told that he would defend his squad list for subsequent games.
Despite guiding Nigeria to qualification for the forthcoming Africa Cup of Nations in Ivory Coast, Peseiro’s uninspiring side trails Rwanda and South Africa in their 2026 World Cup qualifying campaign on the back of two 1-1 draws against Lesotho and Zimbabwe.
In 15 games in charge of the Eagles, Peseiro has won six and lost six with the three-time African champions scoring 31 times – with 10 coming in one game against Sao Tome and Principe – and conceded 21 goals.
“Henceforth, if I remain in the technical committee, if he submits a professional list he would come and justify the list in front of the committee explaining why he invited each player based on their statistics and club performance.
“From our side, we’ve said Peseiro can’t do the job, if you look at how he runs the affairs of the team it seems the Nigeria national team is bigger than him honestly.”
Meanwhile, Sports Minister, John Enoh, has summoned Peseiro over the poor performance of the Eagles in the 2026 World Cup qualifying campaign.
Enoh made this known during a media parley with journalists in Abuja on Wednesday.
He said, “I am happy to report that I had a meeting with the NFF president, secretary and the Technical Department of NFF regarding the Super Eagles.
“What we came out of that is that I’ve had to request that the coach (Peseiro) be summoned and I think at some point next week there’s going to be an engagement with him.
“All of that is trying to respond to the outcome of these matches, especially the World Cup qualifying games.
While reacting to the call from some football stakeholders that the Portuguese should be sacked over poor results, Enoh said that despite the emotions and passions of Nigerians over football, the decision to sack a coach is not taken due to emotions.
“As a minister, I am concerned that the Nigeria national team is not delivering, not meeting up with our expectations. The Africa Cup of Nations is so close that we need to be careful in what decisions we make but the next qualification rounds for the World Cup, the next match is in June, so it gives us more time to take decisions going forward.
“AFCON is going to start January 13, are we going to request to fire the coach (Peseiro), I mean the answer is as good as mine.
“I have found out that in this sector, there are passions and emotions. Where you are seated and where I am providing leadership, you don’t respond, you know you are not driven by passions and emotions.”(Punch)
