10 February 2002
Lagos — Super Eagles assistant coach, Stephen Keshi yesterday dumped the whole blame for Eagles shameful defeat bySenegal on the head of Director of Sports Development, Patrick Ekeji."I don t know who sent Ekeji to come and destabilise the team here.
All was well before he came. But once he came, he scattered everything and demoralised the players", Keshi told a world conference moments after Senegal stopped Nigeria s quest to win her third Nations cup trophy."You can see that it was a tensed match.Our boys put up their best but were equally matched by the Senegalese.
I m not making excuses for them not winning or not playing well. But I think that the presence of Ekeji in our camp caused a lot of distraction.
I think that Nigerians should know who to blame", Keshi insisted. There has been a running battle over unpaid flight ticket refunds with Ekeji insisting that Government would pay $1,200 while the players stuck to their guns for $2,500.
In one of their meetings, Ekeji was said to have told them to go home if they won t take what Government approved for them. The players vowed that they won t get anything less from their demands.
"This is the first time that the players played without complaints of bonus.It is only flight ticket that caused our ouster. It is a shame", one official said.(ACONS)
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