BY CHIOMA ANIEGBOKA
President of the Nigeria football supporters club Rafiu Ladipo has expressed sadness over the failure of the Super Falcons to qualify for the 2012 London Olympics.

In a chat with Sports Vanguard in his office Tuesday, Ladipo lamented, “there is nothing more painful than this. We lost that match to Cameroon in Abuja when we scored two goals and we scored one against ourselves.”

He said the outcome of the two-legged fixture did not surprise him because he knew it was anybody’s game after the first leg. Said he, “I knew we had a difficult task; that we are out of the game so when the match in Cameroon ended 2-1 as it ended in Abuja, we lost faith because I knew it will be very tough for us to win.”

Recounting the catalogue of failures in Nigerian football of late, Ladipo said, “to me it is very sad indeed as we were not in the All Africa Games. The lesson here is that other African countries are catching up with us, because I think we have been taking everything for granted.” .

He said Nigerian players need to improve in the game as players from other countries had caught up with them. “With these results we are getting now, Nigerian players need to up their game.”

He said that Falcons coach Eucharia Uche needed to improve on her technical capacity and go abroad to learn more in coaching.

He supported her purported sack by the NFF. “Eucharia need to go because she failed to qualify us for the All Africa Games and now the Olympics.”