Two matches, but it’s fix-or-die for Eguavoen and Osimhen

Two matches offer just six points in all football competitions, and it is not any different in this case this weekend in the 2025 Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) qualifiers.

But it will be more than those points for the Super Eagles when they take on Benin Republic’s Cheetahs in Uyo on Friday and Rwanda’s Amavubi in Kigali on Tuesday.

By now, Nigerians are used to occasional below-average performances by the Super Eagles, and some of them have even decided to keep their hearts somewhere far from the team’s games.

It is all about retaining their sanity, because the team that has all it takes to succeed at all times in terms of personnel and material resources often times underperforms.

This year, the Super Eagles had raised hopes with the qualification for the final match of the 2023 AFCON in Abidjan, even as their path was not as smooth as expected.

But a 1-2 loss to hosts Côte d'Ivoire was to present a deflation, with several consequences staying unresolved until the 2026 FIFA World Cup qualifiers continued in June.

There, the Eagles, who could only muster two draws from two games earlier in November against Lesotho and Zimbabwe, failed to raise their game to take charge of their group.

Another home draw with South Africa and an away loss to “hosts” Benin Republic in Abidjan could only compound their woes for a chain of actions and reactions.

The rest is now history, and particularly mind-boggling is the fact that Finidi George, who was appointed to take charge after the earlier departure of Jose Peseiro, is no longer there.

Also, there was the outburst by Victor Osimhen, as well as the non-inclusion and non-availability of several players in the matches George took charge of.

Then there was a certain Bruno Labbadia who got appointed but collected no letter of appointment.

These actions and reactions are now going to shape expectations regarding these two games, particularly from new interim coach Austin Eguavoen, who now seems always at hand to call up.

The former right full-back has joined the late Amodu Shaibu in making the most number of returns as head coach to the team than anyone since their first appointment.

However, his appointment is always greeted with so much scepticism that would have made him not to even believe in himself.

Several factors beyond him, in spite of his present position as Technical Director of the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF), have always however affected most of these matches, thereby determining the results achieved.

In 2005, he inherited a team badly bruised by the non-qualification for the 2006 World Cup, while the team he met on the ground in 2010 was disgruntled and in disarray.

Of course, it was a period the NFF was struggling to overcome leadership problems after the South Africa 2010 debacle and the supposed “government interference” in its affairs.

In 2022, he had to grapple with the issue of Peseiro coming to take over hanging over his head, and consequently, there indeed was the problem of concentration.

In the long run, the Super Eagles underperformed at the 2021 AFCON in Cameroon and went on to fail to qualify for the 2022 World Cup.

Now he has returned with several problems hanging over the team ahead of these 2025 AFCON qualifiers, and he is expected to fix them in a matter of days.

It is a matter of fix-or-die for him, because they must beat both Benin Republic and Rwanda so as not to undermine their chances of qualification for Morocco 2025.

But, also, beating them (and especially Benin Republic) will give them bragging rights.

Eguavoen is, however, not alone in the issue of having problems hanging over them.

Several players need to prove themselves to justify the controversies about their non-invitation and non-availability for the June matches in Uyo and Abidjan.

Osimhen among the players, however, has more of the overhanging issues, going back to his transfer matters involving Napoli, Al-Ahli, Chelsea, and Galatasaray.

He will need to prove he is still worth the much-taunted big money value and could have saved his tottering national team in June.

Both Eguavoen and Osimhen are indeed on trial with these two matches, and only the full points from the games will earn them the needed sympathy and understanding.