What Exactly Do You Want Nigeria... Lagaback Phenomenon

Iceland has taken the football world by storm with their Cinderella experience at the current Euro 2016. The question that could be on everyone lips would be; Did the Viking nation get to this stage accidentally? Was it a fluke? We could ask or speculate on the reason behind Iceland current success but they are actually in the quarter-final at the expense of England. I will give a brief information to illustrate that their performance isn't coincidental or by luck. Before the fall of the Icelandic bank, they had invested in training coaches who trains young talents, they made the best of their adverse weather situation and built indoors stadiums and it is yielding  dividends now.

Lagaback in the Nigeria's Colours

I will not dwell much on the developmental aspect of Iceland football but focus on the man that has led Iceland to their most iconic experience ever - He is Lars Lagarback. I need to highlight here that I am not an advocate for a foreign manager far from it, but I just want to highlight what Nigeria might have missed. I have followed Lagaback since his days as a joint manager along side Tommy Soderberg - they were both  in charge of Sweden at the time. Lars Lagarback is not your typical tactical genius but he is very organised, methodical and conservative in approach. He also spends a huge amount of time studying his opponents. A case in point that comes to mind was in 2002 after knowing who their World Cup opponents were, he sent scouts to watch Nigeria. They followed all our friendly games, I remember our own legendary Pa Adegboye Onigbinde stating he does not need to scout opponents, that he will just focus on Nigeria playing their game. When Nigeria eventually played Sweden, they won the game by 2-1.
He took over the helms of affairs in 2011 following his short sting with the Nigerian Super Eagles
(Will come back that later?). Largaback has built the Icelandic to become a formidable unit and the succession in their progress is apparent for all to see. He got Iceland to the play off of the World Cup Qualifiers and they were just 2 legs away from Brazil 2014 World Cup, they lost both games to Croatia. Fast-forward two years later he got Iceland to Euro 2016 brushing aside teams like Netherlands home and away, drew with Portugal, Hungary before eventually defeating Austria  But the biggest shock was yet to come as they surprised England in the round of 16 with a 2-1 victory. This has earned them a well deserved quarter-final against the host team France. According to reports from  Johan Sigurdsson Iceland official reporter the sales figure for Iceland shirt are 1800% higher than anticipated,sold out around the world -this what success can bring you With long term planning success is always inevitable

Now back to Nigeria, I stated all the above to paint a picture of  frugal approach to long-term planning. Lagaback was employed close to 5 months before the World Cup, this was following the dismissal of Late Amodu Shaibu. To put in context Amodu had led Nigeria through out the World Cup Qualifiers. Generally, in my own opinion, he did not inspire confidence and the performance of Nigeria at African Cup of Nations 2010 hosted by Angola did not do enough to support his cause. Anyway he was sacked and replaced by the Swedish coach - some Nigeria football observers felt Amodu should have been allowed to continue what he started moreover he earned that right after securing qualification.

The Media felt the money paid for Lagaback was just to much  and i agree to this, Lagaback was said to have impressed the NFF board with his power point presentation. Unfortunately Nigeria had a  lacklustre performance in South Africa. We lost to Argentina and Greece before securing a score draw against South Korea. Lars Lagaback decline in signing an extension to his deal subsequently he moved on.  Lagaback was called all sorts of names from Lagabeer , Lagafront, Lagafraud ,the reality was he did not know his players well to get a good result. Now this the lesson particularly  in the wake of  Iceland performance, We need to decide weather we want success that is built on long term planning or quick fixes that will get us nowhere.

Our fan and media alike want instant success but we need to decide if we really want  success, then we must be ready to invest time and rid ourselves of the instant gratification syndrome.Nigeria could have been where Iceland is today.