Mass Sacking/Recruitment: Ezeji warns Pillars, Enyimba, other continental clubs

By Akeem Lawal

FORMER NPFL star and LMC players’ advisor Victor Ezeji has warned Nigerian teams going for CAF continental competitions to desist from mass sacking and recruitment of players characterized with the country’s clubsides ahead of new season.

Sportsbiz247.blogspot.com reports that Plateau United and Enyimba will compete in the CAF Champions League, while Rivers United and Kano Pillars will fly the country’s flag in the CAF Confederation Cup. 

According to Ezeji, who won the 2003 CAF Champions League title with Enyimba, incessant sacking of players and recruitment is part of the reasons Nigerian clubs fail to perform on the continent.

“The NPFL rule says for any player that has done up to 10 years and above, you can sign him for one year if you so wish. But for any player that has not gone up to 10 years, the contract should be three years. But these days it is happening back and forth because in most cases, the club will find a player that is under 10 years, give him a contract of three years but when they don’t want the player any longer, they throw him away immediately. They will never remember that the contract they had with the player was three years,” he told Brila FM.

“Now when another club wants a player that is in their team and the player wants to move to that club, that is when they will remember that they had three years contract with him. But the other one you sacked, you forgot that you had three year contract with him. These are things that clubs have been doing that we are trying to put a stop to. If you sign a player for three years, you have to keep him for three years.

“Football is about continuity, that is what most of us fail to understand. When you employ a new coach and when the coach is trying to impact his philosophy into his players and then you come at the end of the season, maybe you win the league or qualify for continental, you slash the team into two. You sack like 15 and you bring in 20.

“Before the coach will start doing what he did last season to get his team in shape, they are out of the continent. That is the main reason you see our teams not thriving in the continent any longer. They do mass sacking and mass recruitment just because they are in the continent.

“You have to look at where you have problems, look at where your team have issues and then replace those very few players. It is only here that we see clubs buying 20 players at the end of every season. Season-in, season-out, the same number. I’m looking at the transfers they are doing now and it is amazing. To see our our representatives are signing up to 10 players to 15 players, how will the coach impart his philosophy into the new players for them to jell and start playing as a unit.

“Football is continuity and that is why I always advocate for teams to have feeder teams where they know the culture, philosophy of the club and the pattern the club plays. But in a situation where you bring-in a new coach in some cases, you bring new players and they start afresh, it will definitely affect the team.”