The Olympic Games football tournament, like all age group tournaments organized by or in conjunction with FIFA has given us a chance to measure the health of our football. By all indications it's healthy!
Looking to add Olympic gold to the U-17 world cup won last year, Nigeria once again showed that there are talents abound in the country...not just playing talent, but coaching talent as well.
For me the biggest positive from the Olympics football tournament is the emergence of Samson Siasia as potential world class coach.Never before have I seen a Nigerian play with so much discipline and tactical guile .For the first time in Nigeria's football history, we have a team that combined all the positive attributes of Nigerian football, skill, strength, speed, attacking through both wings and excellent technical ability, while adding a high level tactical discipline never before seen in an African team. In the process they cut out some of the ills of Nigerian football.
Apart from the two times when the goalkeeper lost concentration and conceded silly errors in the games against Japan and the USA and in the final when the midfield failed to deal with Messi in the lead up to Argentina's goal, the team was excellent. As work in progress, the team is not yet vintage, but like the best French wine, it will get better with age (2014 perhaps?).
Unlike the 1996 team that won gold in Atlanta, this team did not have any stars(Olubayo plays in the Israeli 2nd division, while Efe Ambrose plays in the 2nd tier of the Nigerian league).In fact there was only one star in team, the coach Samson Siasia.
The best managers of the game are known for their ability to get the best out of the players they have...their man management skills and also for their ability to see hidden talents and of course their high tactical awareness among other skills.Siasia seemed to master both and much more!
A colleague in the office (who is not Nigerian, if I may add) pointed out after the semi-final that the team played for Mr. Siasia, the fact they always ran across to him after scoring each goal in the tournament showed that fact. This was in spite of the fact the he criticized them for a poor performance against the USA in the last group game. This shows a man management ability some of the best exponents like Luis Filipe Scolari and Jose Mourinho will be proud of.
His use of players was exemplary. His ability to successfully convert Solomon Okoronkwo, who is a center forward by trade ,to a right winger is straight from Arsene Wenger's book of tricks.
Tactically he set up the team uniquely to deal with each opponent. Their formation was not set on stone especially going forward while each player adapted well to their given role for each match. Chinedu Obasi for example, a forward by trade, was given a free role behind Osaze Odemwingie in the quarter final, while Osaze took over that role in the semi final with Obinna nsofor pushing up further than his always done in previous matches, to set up a rather unique system that can be described as 4-2-4 or 4-3-3 when they have the ball and converts to a 4-2-3-1 when they lose it. His substitution in the semi-final against Belgium bringing in Ekpo for Ajilore, was the main reason why the team scored four goals instead of just one.
Perhaps the one mistake he made in was starting with Isaac Promise in the final. Promise had a rather disappointing tournament and in the final failed to bridge that gap between attack and midfield effectively.
This meant Femi Ajilore had to go forward quite a lot. Maybe be the team could have played dealt with Argentina better if he had started with Emma Ekpo in a 4-2-3-1.This way Ajilore would have stayed back more to keep a closer eye on Messi. Kaita did the same on Requielme, even though it did little to nullify his overall influence, it stopped him from been a major treat going forward for Argentina. Again Ekpo plays in the MLS in the USA were games sometimes are played in mid-afternoon in the summer heat. I believe he would have adapted to the conditions better than most of his team mates.
In summary, it was great tournament for Nigeria and just like the win in the U-17 World last year in South Korea showed, the future of Nigeria football is very bright.
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