The Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) president, Amaju Pinnick, claims Gernot Rohr was fired as Super Eagles coach due to the team’s lack of discipline.
On Sunday, the NFF announced Rohr’s firing and named Augustine Eguavoen as the temporary coach.
Pinnick, speaking on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily on Monday, claimed that, contrary to common belief, a lack of motivation due to inadequate welfare played no factor in the decision to break company with Rohr.
He claims the NFF owes the players only two match allowances, whereas Gernot Rohr is owed “a couple of months” despite being paid for five months recently.
The decision to fire Rohr was made collaboratively by members of the football committee, according to Pinnick, who added that various issues were taken into account.
“It wasn’t an individual decision, it was a collective decision by the entire football committee,” he said.
“We were winning our games but there are a lot of things we put into cognizance. When you look at it, you don’t want to blame but let it go and move on to a new hope and new zeal.”
“We did everything for one major factor — that discipline in the team has practically been lost in the dressing room. Discipline in the team was at its lowest and once you remove discipline, that foundation on the team will be lost.”
“Players will now turn back at you. Players will believe they are indispensable. A lot of factors that will now militate against the team.
“So, we need to change things because leadership is all about protecting whoever is working with you. We don’t want to go through all that, we had to take the bull by the horn before disaster starts happening. It was about to happen.
“We are only owing about two matches of all the matches they played in both AFCON qualifiers and World Cup qualifiers. For Gernot Rohr, I know we paid him for about five months. We were owing him for a couple of months, then we cleared about five months.”
Even though Rohr’s contract required him to work in Nigeria, Pinnick backed Rohr’s desire to work from abroad in October.
