SUPER EAGLES JOB: Plot to stop Keshi thickens

The last has not been heard about the quest of former Mali and Togo senior teams’ chief coach, Stephen Keshi to retain his job as the Super Eagles’ tactician for another two years.

SportingLife gathered from those who should know at the Glass House on Sunday that some Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) members are miffed that the federation’s president, Melvin Amaju Pinnick could constitute a three-man panel to negotiate a deal with Keshi, despite his abysmal failure with the Eagles at the qualification matches for the 2015 Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON), which the Elephants  of Cote d’ Ivoire won in Equatorial Guinea.

SportingLife scooped that many members are waiting for the board’s next executive meeting – tentatively slated for Thursday – to tell the president their views on the matter, with words rife that they would outrightly reject Keshi’s return to the Super Eagles on grounds of a controversial interview where he described Pinnick as a liar for mis-informing Nigerians about the purported unpaid two months’ salaries.

Besides, the members would draw the president’s attention to the unannimous verdicts by the members of the Sports Committee in the House of Representatives and the Senate urging the NFF not to renew Keshi’s contract having failed to qualify Nigeria for the 2015 Africa Cup of Nations.

These members have vowed to announce a new Super Eagles coach if the NFF is cajoled by anyone to keep Keshi on the job, having witnessed how Siasia was sacked for not qualifying Nigeria for the 2012 AFCON amongst other failed coaches who lost their jobs in the past.

Interestingly, the earlier slated Monday (today) or Tuesday’s meeting with Keshi, his manager and lawyer in Abuja, has been cancelled forthwith.

Instead, a source close to the three-man panel revealed that Keshi would be presented with another contractual terms where he either takes it or rejects it. In fact, a member of the panel appealed to the media not to heat up the polity with the Keshi saga, insisting that the NFF would announce a new Super Eagles chief coach at the appropriate time.