Why I Didn’t Apply For Eagles Coaching Job – Vincent Enyeama
FORMER Super Eagles goalkeeper, Vincent Enyeama has advanced reasons why he did apply for the team’s coaching job following the exit of Portuguese tactician, Jose Peseiro.
The 2013 Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) winner revealed his eyes are set on becoming the head coach of the Super Eagles in the not-too-distant future.
The former Lille star confessed that two factors stopped him from joining others in applying for the position, as it has been vacant since the departure of Peseiro.
It would be recalled that several former Nigeria internationals, including Daniel Amokachi, Michael Nsien, George Finidi, and Emmanuel Amunike, showed interest in becoming the head coach of the national team after Peseiro quit the role.
In between his business endeavours, Enyeama has been shuttling Europe and Nigeria, working on getting his coaching papers.
The former Enyimba FC goalie maintains that, but for these two impediments, he would have been in the running to be the new Super Eagles coach.
Asked in a chat with Afrik-Foot why he has not applied to work with the national team as many others have done, Enyeama replied:: “No, no, no. It’s not that I am not interested; it’s just that I am not certified,” Enyeama said.
“For you to be able to coach the Super Eagles, you must be certified. That’s the minimum standard.
“That’s the number one reason, and the fact that I have been very busy developing and managing my hotel has taken a lot of my attention, and that business is the most important thing for me now.
“So football is like number two for me now, unless just one day the Nigeria Football Federation says, ‘Please come and share your wealth of experience in this area with these players,’ then it becomes a different thing altogether.
“For now, I have to wait until I get the necessary certificate before I can say this is where I want to coach or the area where I can support the national teams.”
Enyeama also mentioned that he prefers to coach a full team rather than just a goalkeeper trainer.
“Whatever I am doing now is how to become a full coach of a team, and not just goalies trainer. If I have to be a goalies trainer then, it has to be with very young ones in junior teams because they are the ones you really teach. They are still growing and open to learning new things; with these ones, you can easily transmit what you want.
“Some of the established goalkeepers are not so easy to manage because they already have fixed mindsets kind of. When you are called into the national team, you don’t really coach them but manage them. That’s why most trainers usually introduce exercises that would keep the goalkeepers very fit, as they already are formed and firm in other areas.
“It will be nice to manage the full team because, as a goalkeeper, you always have a full view of the field and what everyone is doing at any given time. And that’s why most goalies make good coaches, and most midfielders do well too, as we can see in (Pep) Guardiola, (Xabi) Alonso, Xavi. They were all midfielders,” Enyeama said.
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