By Ikeddy Isiguzo
SAMSON Siasia has dangerous friends. They could ruin him. I do not know their names. He may not even know them personally, but they are those who see nothing wrong in whatever the coach does – they can explain it, and try to enforce their position on others.

For them Siasia does no wrong, can do no wrong. If you listen closely, you will hear them excusing anything the coach does. He needs time, the competition is unimportant, he will deliver at the appropriate time, and he knows what he is doing.

I have read some of the comments on the 3-2 loss to Togo in the WAFU Nations Cup, a competition, which I think, was good for the exposure it gave our players from the domestic league. The comments are mainly defences for Siasia.

How can someone say WAFU Nations Cup is not important to us? Another explanation was the players from the domestic were bad. A few days earlier, they were good when they beat Ghana! A more plausible comment was that we cannot win everything.

Those were Siasia’s friends at work. They are against others criticising him. They forget that he needs to be told he let Nigerians down. For those who have their eyes on FIFA rankings, this competition could affect Nigeria.

For me the importance lies elsewhere. Our players, at all levels, must learn to respect all teams. After beating Ghana, they thought they had won the competition. It was the duty (responsibility) of the coach to get them back to the concentration the final required.

The way to learn anything from this loss is to admit it happened. Would Siasia’s friends have dismissed the competition if he won it? We have to be careful so that we put things in perspective.

Are we down playing the fact that Stephen Keshi’s presence in Togo could make a difference? Was the loss to Keshi or to Togo? We can debate it all we like, but Togo (Keshi) is close enough to keep Siasia under pressure. They both wanted the job. Keshi even suggested they work together. We all know the rest of the story.

I heard Keshi was not at the WAFU competition. He had a meeting with the team and left. So it was a local Togolese coach who dealt with us.

Is that not worse in the light of the hype around the game against Argentina?

Older folks will remember decades of Togo being troublesome in competitive football. Togo in 1983 defeated Nigeria 5-2 in the WAFU Nations Cup in Burkina Faso. Mitchel Obi was the one relaying the bad news to us in the newsroom as we listened in disbelief. We doubted translation of the radio broadcast of the game from Africa Numero Un, but it was true. Such were the sort of heartaches we have had from the Eagles for years.

Let us not be deceived, the Eagles whether home-based or abroad, still lack appreciation of the implications of their performance or lack of it. The challenges against Siasia are going to be stiffer by the day. We, his friends, can really help him, if we keep reminding him about the higher expectations from Nigeria’s coach.

Wanjiru – Death @ Dusk
TWENTY years after his compatriot Paul Ereng became Olympic 800m champion at 18, Sammy Wanjiru won the Olympic gold in Peking (Beijing) in 2008. By dusk on Sunday, he died in controversial circumstances.

At 24, Sammy had become almost everything most athletes want to be – an Olympic marathon champion at 21, winner of Chicago and London marathons and the best bet to take the marathon gold at the London Olympics next year.

Was he pushed off the first floor of his home in the Rift Valley? Did he jump to his death? Whatever the answers, he is gone, leaving behind a wife with whom he tangled, millions of fans across the globe and the Kenyan federation that would keep wondering what could have gone wrong with one of Kenya’s young millionaire, a growing class of those who have prospered through athletics.

An issue that comes to the fore again is helping African young athletes manage fame and fortune. Kenya could pull out another performer from its seemingly inexhaustible nursery, but we would be left wondering what Sammy would have done next after his dominance of the marathon, a race where older people thrive.
May he, in death, find the peace that eluded him.

One  Gold Gone!
THE pretence at shock for the Falcons’ failure to qualify for the All Africa Games is all part of the game. It serves us right if we are really shocked. We take too many things for granted. One official said Nigeria already thought it had the gold medal for women’s football in the bag even before qualifying for the competition.

We never take women’s football (or any football) serious. What counts is the honour to be won, not the preparations fro the competition.