Nigeria interim head coach and Football Federation (NFF) Technical Director Augustine Eguavoen has spoken about Olisah Ndah’s rise in football and how he was first scouted for the Super Eagles.
The centre-back has enjoyed a steady rise in his career and some stability at club level with Orlando Pirates where he is also one of the captains.
His consistency has seen the player get back into his national team for the Africa Cup of Nations qualifiers against Benin and Rwanda. This was his first time in the squad since the 2022 AFCON. Ndah has helped the 2023 AFCON silver medallists to top qualifying group D with seven points from three matches, even though he missed the current squad due to injury.
Eguavoen spoke to iDiski Times senior writer Velile Mnyandu in the latest edition of the newspaper where he spoke about Ndah’s journey and those who were kind to recommend him and goalkeeper Stanley Nwabali for the squad.
“Yes I never knew Ndah but I think when someone does well you have to give them all the praises and accolades as well,” Eguavoen told iDiski Times.
“There was a commissioner for sports in River state, we met somewhere in Port Harcourt. We went to watch Rivers United against a team from Burkina Faso I think some years ago. After the game the commissioner came back and said coach I have a player for you. I said ‘really’ he said ‘his name is Ndah try to watch him’ he plays for Akwa United”.
“These are people who mean well for the country. He’s not asking to take Ndah to his team. He is saying I spotted a player in another team and I think he can do well at national team level which means he wants the game to grow. I said ‘Okay when the opportunity comes we’ll look at him’”.
“So a chance came when we had an invitational game against Mexico a few years ago. I didn’t go to that tournament for some reason but I was supposed to go with the team. But my assistant and others went and I saw him training. This is the kind of player that suits my style of football. So from then I had interest and also the then chairman of Lobi [Stars] also told me about the goalkeeper Nwabali”.
“He said coach I have a goalkeeper for you I said send him through. He came and I saw him, he’s massive, he’s got strength, he was brave and the goalkeeper coach said yes this is what we want. The two of them were in the team but we lost 4-0 to Mexico but they were outstanding. So from then on I really picked interest in them”.
