Stephen Keshi, Nigeria’s national football team coach who resigned after the team’s last game at the ongoing Brazil 2014 World Cup, has revealed that he would love to stay on as the national team’s coach if Nigeria would be fairer in terms of contracts signed with him.
Keshi, the first Nigerian coach to have led the team past the group stage at any World Cup campaign, said he really would like to stay on as the team’s handler and continue with what he described as the “Nigerian Project” but that if the conditions offered to extend his expired contract is not fairer than the just concluded one, he would rather pitch his tent with other countries now on his trail for the job.
“If the offer isn’t good enough for me, then I will explore other options and possibly move on to another challenge,” Keshi said in an interview.
“Well for example, my previous contract was never respected. I was paying one of my assistants (Valerie Houandonou) for over a year, my former assistant Sylvanus Okpala was sacked without my consent and those things just never made sense.”
While asserting his love for his country’s national assignment, the former handler of Togo and Mali national team also expressed belief that it is not a bad thing to “experience other climates” elsewhere if one climate is not fair enough.
“I mean Nigeria is my country and I love my country, but I’m out of contract now so I have to move on. I have spent over two years as coach of Nigeria, and Nigeria flows in my veins but I just have to move on,” he said.
He said if the offer comes, from Nigeria to renew his contract he would accept the job if the conditions are satisfactory, but for now the offer from Nigeria has not come. Meanwhile, several other countries especially South Africa is wooing him for a national team assignment.
“I’ve given my heart to Nigeria; I have done it for the country for years. I played as a captain of the national team for 14years so this isn’t about heart anymore,” Keshi said. “It’s now about professionalism, I am a professional football coach and that is all I do. I have kids in the university that I have to feed and I can’t do that by ‘heart’. Doing the ‘heart’ thing cannot work anymore, because that isn’t going to put food on my table.”
 |
|
