Coach of the Flying Antelopes, Abdul Makaiba has faulted the process and the unstable calendar in Nigeria as he claims the FA cup is supposed to go hand in hand with the league games.
“The calendar is supposed to be on at the beginning of the season, we should know that we are playing our FA Cup from a specific time frame. Not until we have finished the league then we will start thinking of when to play the FA Cup. Some teams don’t even know when they will be playing their FA Cup games and where. I don’t think the organization is ok. though there is room to improve on that. They need to improve on the organization of their FA Cup.
It’s about two weeks since the Nigeria Professional Football League, NPFL ended and so far, the league has provided two teams that will represent the country in the CAF Champions League and one other to represent Nigeria in the CAF Confederation’s Cup. The other ticket to the Confederation’s Cup will be gotten from the winner of the Nigerian FA Cup although, the FA Cup is yet to start. The FA Cup was earlier slated to start Wednesday 27th, 2022 but was soon shifted to 30th July.
Unlike the conventional way of running the league and the FA Cup simultaneously, the FA Cup is set to cut short the holidays of both coaches and players which has caused the game players to raise eyebrows.
After managing to escape relegation, Lobi Stars Coach, Muhammed Babaganaru has added his voice to express his dismay at the unstable calendar of the Confederation’s Cup, stating the inconveniences and irregularities associated with the said calendar. He clamored for a standard calendar like that of Europe and seek to be treated with urgency. “We need to have a standard calendar we should follow. We should know when each competition starts and when it stops. Right now we don’t have a standard calendar. Look at Europe, almost all the fixtures are out now. The league, the pre-season, and everything. But we here, we don’t know when anything will start. We don’t have a calendar for us to follow. That’s my request.”
The winner of the Nigerian FA Cup will join league third-place finisher, Remo Stars to fly the flags of Nigeria in the second-tier football tournament in the African continent.
