President of the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) Amaju Pinnick said he consulted Portuguese gaffer Jose Mourinho and French manager Arsene Wenger in the search for a new Super Eagles coach.
The NFF boss said this in a media parley on Wednesday in Lagos State, noting that the football body will bring a coach that is “hungry” and “ready for the challenge” of tutoring the three-time African champions.
“I also spoke with Arsene. Arsene is our technical director at FIFA. I had an interface with him about some of these coaches. And of course [we spoke to ]Mourinho. I am not going to tell you that we did not speak to Mourinho,” Pinnick explained, less than two weeks after Gernot Rohr was dismissed as the team’s coach.
“These are some of the best coaches in the world. And there is nothing wrong with it because he [Wenger] is equally concerned just the way we are.”
Pinnick, who also noted that the NFF has held talks with a former Real Madrid assistant coach and FC Porto head coach Jose Peseiro; Serbian Mladen Krstajic, said the body will stick to its recruitment process in hiring a new manager for the Super Eagles.
“The emphasis on the new coach is discipline. We will look at his antecedents on discipline,” he added.
“Secondly, we will also look at how hungry he is to win trophies because if they are hungry it supersedes so many things and if he wants to win, he will instill discipline. We will look at all these things but I cannot make a pronouncement emphatically because I will be undermining my executive committee.
“So, until my executive committee comes out within the next week or so to say this is the name because the technical committee has to bring their presentation to the executive committee. It is going to be a seamless movement to the current team headed by Eguavoen.”
