The Nigeria Football Federation(NFF)'s decision to appoint a foreign technical assistant coach for Stephen Keshi has met a brick-wall as the current Super Eagles manager would rather have the NFF reinstate Sylvanus Okpala than a have a foreign coach. An NFF official told Vanguard newspaper Nigeria needs a technical assistant if they want to do well in the World Cup, "it is about Nigeria and not individual aspirations. We want to break the African record of a quarterfinal berth in the World Cup and from all indications we know that Keshi needs a help. He will still lead the technical crew to Brazil and will remain the head coach. But we just want to attach somebody to him for the sake of improving Nigeria's lot in the World Cup."Citing the recently-concluded CHAN competition, Suleiman Yahaya Kwande, another official stated that Keshi didn't pick the best players at the home front.
"Chigozia Agbim, for example, kept only two matches for his club throughout the season and has recently been dropped by his club, Enugu Rangers who registered four goal keepers and found him not good enough to be among their keepers. That's the keeper Keshi used in the CHAN competition and he embarrassed the country. He continued, "That cannot happen in football nations. We don't fold our arms while somebody leads us astray. If you closely watch our league you will find out that those who played CHAN in South Africa were not our best, some may not even make the second team of the bests in our league. We want to be sure that we make a true representation of the current best of Nigerian football in Brazil and a new hand may not give in to the kind of sentiments that we have noticed in the team now.""We have two goalkeepers that were rated the best in the Nigeria Premier League last season from Enyimba Football Club and Kano Pillars. None of these goalkeepers were called up by Keshi. We ought to have got a better striker from the local league compared with the ones we paraded in Chan. I don't know and I can't remember the last time or ever hearing that Keshi has gone round to watch Enyimba Football Club, Kano Pillars or Bayelsa United football clubs play another team. I think we should try and localise this competition more, I believe we will do better."