The Nigerian Football Federation (NFF) should hang its head in shame. After eight matches, the Super Eagles are staring down the barrel of missing the 2026 FIFA World Cup — and all the NFF can offer is a bland press statement that reads more like a child’s excuse than an admission of failure.
For a country that prides itself as the giant of Africa, our football has been reduced to a theatre of incompetence. A 1–1 draw against South Africa in Bloemfontein was not a brave fight; it was another dismal outing in a qualifying campaign that reeks of poor planning, lack of vision, and administrative rot.
The NFF wants Nigerians to clap for a draw that leaves us stranded on 11 points, six behind South Africa with only two matches left. That is not progress; that is national disgrace.
The statement released by the NFF Communications Department is insulting to the intelligence of millions of Nigerians.It tries to dress up calamity as resilience. It hides behind long descriptions of player movements and substitutions, when the real issue is glaring, Nigeria is failing, and the leadership of the NFF is the architect of this failure.
What business does the NFF have narrating how Calvin Bassey “ran with the ball upfront” or how Fisayo Dele-Bashiru delivered a pull-out. Nigerians are not blind.We watched the game. What we demand to know is why a country of over 200 million people, blessed with a legion of talent, cannot put together a team capable of beating South Africa. That failure is not tactical; it is institutional.
This is not about William Ekong’s own goal. Own goals happen in football. This is about years of clueless leadership, ill-prepared coaching choices, chaotic player management, and a Federation that treats football like a personal estate. If the NFF cannot deliver victory in crucial qualifiers, then they have no moral right to remain in office.
Every qualifying campaign in recent times has been a story of last-minute scrambling, endless excuses, and dashed hopes. The 2026 qualifiers have been no different. Instead of learning from past blunders, the NFF doubled down on mediocrity, and now the Super Eagles are trapped in a group where even Lesotho and Benin Republic have become dangerous obstacles.
Nigerians are tired of being taken for fools.We deserve accountability, not excuses. We deserve results, not endless communiqués padded with hollow statistics. The NFF owes Nigerians an apology for this shoddy campaign, and more importantly, they owe us their resignation. Anything less is an insult.
Nigeria’s failure to qualify for the 2026 World Cup will not be the fault of players alone. It will be the direct consequence of the NFF’s arrogance and negligence. When administrators are more concerned with political lobbying and FIFA junkets than building a winning team, failure is inevitable. And now that failure is staring us in the face.
For how long will this charade continue? How many more humiliations will Nigerians endure before the house of cards called the NFF collapses under its own incompetence? If there is any decency left in that Federation, the entire board should tender their resignation today. They have failed the country, failed the players, and failed the fans.
Football is not just a game in Nigeria; it is a national glue, a source of unity and pride. To toy with it, to run it into the ground through sheer incompetence, is nothing short of sabotage. The NFF has dragged Nigeria’s name in the mud of football politics and deserves no sympathy.
If Nigeria misses out on the 2026 World Cup, history will not be kind. It will remember this NFF as the Board that took the dreams of millions and trampled them underfoot. It will remember them as the men and women who failed to resign when resignation was the only honourable option left.
Nigerians must demand better. The NFF must go. Not tomorrow. Not next year. Today.
