The Nigeria Football Federation has said insinuations that the NFF was at war with the national team make-up during the SA 2013 tournament was far from the truth as the NFF President and most of his board members attended virtually all the training sessions of the team leading to the victory over Burkina Faso in Johannesburg.
“No single person can win a tournament of the magnitude of the Nations Cup, it was a collective job and Head Coach, Stephen Keshi, acknowledged that fact and has repeatedly said so. So we must be careful in labeling the NFF, because they provided all necessary logistics for friendly games leading to the tournament and stood by the technical crew even when majority of Nigerians wrote them off”, Alaiya quoted Atta as saying.
On the controversial issue of tickets being issued ahead of the tie against Cote D? Ivoire, Achor, declared that it was a CAF regulation to prepare tickets for the two teams that were playing the quarter finals in advance, as none of them was to stay in the hotel beyond 24 hours after the game. Even the team that qualifies was also to move to the next venue of the tournament immediately, according to CAF regulations. “So, the Ivoriens also had their departure tickets and you will recall that they left under 24 hours. So there should be no controversy over that”. It was based on that proposal from CAF that I spoke to all the players on where they would like their tickets to be routed and I am sure that the Ivorien federation also did same to their team. So there was no issue about the NFF or the backroom staff as we are now labeled wishing the team bad”, he declared.
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