Onochie Anibeze
13 October 2008
Amodu Shuaibu had some drinks with Samson Siasia at the Eagles' Nicon Luxury Hotel to exchange pleasantries and also celebrate Eagles' six- match victory run after the Super Eagles hit Sierra Leone 4-1 to confirm their top status in their World Cup and Nations Cup group.
The media had imagined that the two mustered apathy against each other when the national team job was offered to Amodu after Siasia was recorded as having placed first in the interview. A lot of acrimony had followed since then, interestingly not by the coaches but in the media and other quarters.
There appeared to be a campaign for Siasia to join forces with Amodu in handling the Super Eagles especially after Siasia returned from the Beijing Olympics with a silver medal and his team acclaimed to be good. But Amodu was equally doing well with the Eagles and has not shown any lapse to warrant hir reassignment.
"Siasia was in the Eagles hotel to congratulate the team and he had coffee with Amodu together. They chatted for long and Siasia congratulated the team. It was a pleasant session," spokesman of the Eagles Idah Peterside said after he had complained bitterly about reports that the Eagles, led by Amodu, shunned the post match media briefing at the stadium.
"After the match, the Sierra Leone team were first asked to go for the media chat. By the time it reached our turn, the match commissioner stepped out to ask us to stay back because of the crowd that was surging towards the dressing rooms. We are used to it and could have gone on to address the media but we had to abide by what the match commissioner said lest we were accused of flouting instruction," Peterside said.
Amodu himself said that he was already stepping out with Obinna Nsofor before the match commissioner, Ouma-rou Biambedou from Niger Republic stopped them.
"Why would I shun the media? Why would I not come out for a normal football tradition?" Amodu said repeatedly.
Daniel Amokachi was even furious that they were stopped from talking to the media.
"On our own, we wanted to meet the media. Don't forget that it was on a day we concluded our group matches and capped it with another victory. We wanted to blow our trumpet if you guys would not do so for us. It was a day we wanted to meet the media but we were stopped. It is unfortunate that some people have gone to paint us bad on the false grounds that we deliberately stayed away from the media," Daniel Amokachi said.
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