Gernot Rohr has openly admitted that he wants to continue in his role as coach of the senior national team of Nigeria despite their failure to progress beyond the group stages of the ongoing Russia 2018 World Cup.
Nigeria were sent packing from the World Cup yesterday after suffering a 1-2 loss against Argentina in their final group D game to finish as third behind the top two Croatia and Argentina respectively.
Rohr who has been in charge of the Super Eagles since 2016 says the team is moving in the right direction and wants to continue as coach with the 2019 African Cup of Nations as his immediate target with the team.
According to the coach, a lot has been achieved by the team considering the fact that he took over the team after their failure to qualify for back to back African Cup of Nations before his appointment.
The Franco-German coach made his intention of continuing as coach of the team public at the post match conference held after the 1-2 loss to Argentina.
“It’s a big disappointment, my team did the best, played a very good second half and are missing a few minutes to have qualified. I am proud of my players. We played well in the second half, we are missing a bit of experience, we have a young team and I think these kind of matches are building the character of the team and in four years they will be very strong.
“I would like to continue because I have a good feeling with this team. We have players who are very young doing well. It’s a good cocktail of youth, passion and discipline. We have never had any problems.
“We lost the first game, worked very hard to be better in the second and they did so well that we hoped to come through against Argentina.
“Like you see, we miss a bit of experience in the last minutes, but this is building the character and we will learn and be better in the next cup – the AFCON – and I hope we will do well in this competition.”
Ade Emmanuel
