siasia regrets starting osaze, mikel

SUPER Eagles coach, Samson Siasia has admitted making a terrible mistake in starting Osaze Odemwingie and Mikel Obi against Syli Stars of Guinea in the last match Group B of the 2012 Nations Cup qualifier.
He also lamented the 1-0 loss suffered by Nigeria to Guinea last year in Conakry going as far as describing the loss as “a sabotage”.
“Siasia told the technical committee when he met them last week Thursday that he ought not to have at least started Osaze against Guinea, ditto for Mikel, who was fined for reporting late to camp,” a source close to the NFF technical committee informed MTNFootball.com
“He said he thought seriously of benching or even dropping Mikel for the game but was also very much aware that such a decision may also not be well received by the public.”
Osaze returned from a two-match ban imposed on him by Siasia for walking out on the Eagles in March, but was off from against the Syli Stars as he flopped several begging chances particularly in the first half of that ill-fated game that finished 2-2.
Siasia equally bemoaned the 1-0 loss to Guinea by the Eagles under caretaker coach Austin Eguavoen in October 2010.
That was the team’s only loss in the qualifying tournament, but in the end it had a huge bearing on determining the final qualifiers for the 2012 Nations Cup in Gabon and Equatorial Guinea.
However, a top member of the technical committee told Siasia that this was not “a sabotage” and that the under-fire Eagles handler ought not to have taken up the team a month later, if he was not sure he could still qualify the team to the Nations Cup proper.
Meanwhile, FORMER Nigerian International, Victor Ikpeba has described Osaze Odemwinge as a disgrace to Nigerian football.
Speaking yesterday on Monday Night Football show on Super Sports, the Prince of Monaco tagged soccer star said for Osaze to have lied that he was struggling with an ankle injury for over two months and then decided to go for surgery, when actually he was not in peril at that time, showed the quality of the players he was and which should be condemned by all well meaning Nigerians.
He said "If Osaze were to be a German player, he would have been banned at least for a year or more."
His performance against Guinea in Abuja this month in a match that cost Nigeria a place in next year's Nations Cup would not go unforgotten and Nigerians would not forgive him.
"Osaze is not a good ambassador of the country and he needs to be banned to serve as deterents to others. He scored a brillant goal for West Brom on Sunday but failed to do the same for his country (Nigeria) last weekend," Ikpeba who is a member of the Nigeria Football federation (NFF) technical committee disclosed.
Ikpeba said Osaze cannot continue like that "He needs to apologise to Nigerians for his actions and utterances," he said.