I saw very wretched off the ball movement from all front three. I wouldn't talk about Paul Onuachu. He should have been given a placard for #EndSars, at least his height would have been put to good use.

Iwobi had shitty cover in the midfield hence he had to go deep and was missing sometimes during transition.
It was great seeing we have FB that can really cause headache too.

Our bench still is full of names not players.

CornOak:


Points to note:

1. The team last played 11 months ago
2. Had training for 3 days before match
3. Several new players
4. Match was a test game with less emphasis on result (highlighted by the coach)
5. Our key players were missing

These points led to:

6. Low team cohesion, communication, and spirit
7. Exposed unwanted players
8. Identified our weak areas ( midfield and set pieces issue which hasn't been solved yet)


Well, the points above are no excuses for the shambolic display. However, we should note that today's match was fairly okay considering these factors. By the way, both teams were not impressive either.

Lastly, the technical crew still has a lot of work to do to bring the team back to order. So I agree with your point about Rohr.

PS: Tunisia beat Sudan 3-0 today.

Best Criticism I've seen so far

Goke7:


If we love this team, we should wish the team not qualifying for the next afcon so rohr can go but if we qualify, expect to be more angry with this team

Abegi !!!!!!!!!! Make we no qualify bcus u no like Rohr football.

Clint02:
I love his confidence. Balogun too,he was brimming with confidence throughout the game.

I hope he starts playing for his club, besides, the one chosen ahead of him by his club coach has been very very poor

Make una chill, ema 4... Im sure tunisia will be better than this....

I saw a lot of debut tonite, 4 me thats d koko... Almost half d team were debutant vs an unbeaten defending champion...

I nor understand why una go dey hype sanusi

That guy nor good

Ola Aina anyday anytime

Subzero047:
Those who argued with me about Balogun should get ready to tender their apologies

Many highly respected members of this thread even said, and I quote, "Ekong is the only defender assured of his starting spot, Balogun, Semi Ajayi, Omeruo and Awaziem will fight for the other spot".

I don't know how some people watch football though, but as for me, I have never seen Ekong play good football as a defender. His game is just aimless clearances and wild tackles. Ekong as a defender is not disciplined enough to start in any Bundesliga club.

I have not seen a manager manhandle this amount of talent like Rohr is doing.

These are my team ratings:

Maduka: 8
Put no foot wrong although was not tested enough. Made a great save from a Mahrez free kick and had a good command of his area. Cemented that No 1 spot.

Zaidu Sanusi: 5
Not a inspiring debut at all. He gave the ball away countless times and for a player who is known for his attacking prowess, he misplaced passes and struggled with his crosses.

Troost-ekong: 5
Didn't show any leadership quality. For the quality he's known for, this was not a good outing.

Balogun: 7
The true leader of this team. Very vocal and was willing to run at Algeria when the more attacking players failed. Made important interceptions also. A good game for a player returning from injury.

Ebuehi: 8 MOTM
Showed his quality all through. Was good when going forward and when defending. A very good outing.

Ajayi: 4
Abysmal performance. Did everything wrong in that holding role. Couldn't win possession nor progress possession. This may be down to being played out of position, but not a good match at all.

Frank Onyeka: 5
For all the hype around this player, this performance brought us all down to earth. Showed no quality and was part of a very passive midfield.

Iwobi: 6
A hardworking performance. Was shouldered with too much defensive responsibility and this limited his attacking output. Although he misplaced easy passes, it wasn't a bad game for him.

Chukwueze: 5
Was all dribble and no end product. Caused a lot of moves to breakdown down that right.

Samuel Kalu: 4
Couldn't dribble or make any productive attacking productivity. This left hand side is very much up for grab.

Onuachu: 3
The worst player on the pitch. The game plan was built around him and the kept lumping long balls towards the player. But with over 2m in height, easily being the tallest player on the pitch he made a mess of himself. Lost aerial duels against shorter opponents, couldn't trap the ball to feet, too lazy to press Algeria's back line, poor movement and very awful positional awareness. I'm sure he was flagged offside more times than he completed passes.
I rate Cyriel Dessers a lot, but Dessers must be a fridge for this vegetable of a player to consistently outperform him at Genk.

Rohr: 4
The tactic was wrong from start. A 3 man defence with wingbacks would have been better, but he played the right player in a wrong position.
He also failed to see the very obvious tepidity and passiveness of the midfield nor the poor showing of Onuachu.
He waited till over an hour to change the striker. And unlike his opposite coach, he didn't seem perturbed by the teams performance. He doesn't seem to have any tactical nous also.
The team also showed poor mentality by continuously kicking the ball out of play when we needed a goal. Even more surprising was that fresh players like Iheanacho and Agu were guilty of this. Although Agu had a good sub appearance.
Being Nigeria, we always need a wake up call to keep our eyes open so we will bounce back from this.

Up The Eagles.

Samueltemi337:
Like he delivered a good cross or a nice pass

Watch what Mahrez did to collins at the last AFCON and come back for this argument

kentebemoney:

Plan was 4-2-3-1, worked well in the first half, change of personnel (Agu for Frank) upset the midfield chemistry.
Good game from both sides. Nice to see tijani play.

Game I watched was completely the opposite of everything above, except for maybe the last sentence.

I no even dey look the other players.

My only concern was for Okoye.

I know as Twitter guys want use yabs finish my boy last week, dem don dey compare am to RLC, dey talk say all these fine boy players no dey sabi play.

Anyway, I'm glad he proved them wrong. Good performance today.

The rest of the team is understandably shaky, and like Rohr said, it is to be expected. New players, they've been out 11 months, no cohesion. I don't know what you guys were expecting sha. It was a decent game, and the goal was even scrappy, so, nothing shele

Samueltemi337:
I nor understand why una go dey hype sanusi


That guy nor good


Ola Aina anyday anytime

A swear down!!!! ¡
Mahrez for barbecue Aina.

Olulong:


Watch what Mahrez did to collins at the last AFCON and come back for this argument

Collins na player


Na so una hype idowu but we see where that one end

eazyjakes:
Maenwhile Ekong fidgets like a toddler with a ball on his feet....so much for a vice captain!

Was there ever a time Ekong could play good passes. His nightmare is giving him ball in the box 18

Today's game was quite boring...
Nevertheless,I have a few things to say..

1) Sub-Zero,I guess I owe u an apology for the Balogun argument.. I was wrong! The man still has it... Our best player today by far!! His days in the national team is nowhere close to being over yet..
As for Ekong, smh.. he hasn't improved at all...still poor with his decision making on the ball...
2) Our attack was largely blunt today....all our wingers were off form,with a striker like Onuachu,ur wingers shouldn't be off form,u will struggle..... I don't care if Onuachu scores 100 goals this season for Genk,he shouldn't be starting games for us again...not that he is a poor player,his style of play is just not suited for this team.. I could have swore that 80% of his ball possession went to his head,and they lead nowhere!
3) Our midfield in the first half was poor...WTF was Onyeka doing . Iwobi tried,but too many misplaced passes here and there. We really missed Ndidi,Etebo and Aribo.. seriously,they don't have capable replacements as at now!

4) Zaidu looks promising... he is fast and quite okay defensively... Ebuehi looked good too... Rohr should have brought in Aina for Ebuehi.. I don't know why Akpoguma had to play RB..
Okoye tried too.. He looks promising..


5) Rohr is still tactically clueless... I don't even know what our game plan was throughout... Everything seemed out of place..

I hope to see a better performance against Tunisia....

barackodam:
Is that the Akpoguma y'all hailing would walk into the team?

Guy played poorly in 20 mins than Ekong did in 90

Dude looked overwhelmed for the 20mins he played.

kentebemoney:

Abegi !!!!!!!!!! Make we no qualify bcus u no like Rohr football.

As in, like, just imagine.

Make we collect national shame because person no like Rohr, be like the two AFCON wey we miss after 2013, no too pain some people like that

safarigirl:


As in, like, just imagine.

Make we collect national shame because person no like Rohr, be like the two AFCON wey we miss after 2013, no too pain some people like that

Sister mi, nothing wey we no go see for buhari regime.

smartsmith0907:
It nice to have oga joebie in the house I hope to see more of you oga charlesemeka has been on ghost mode
Our tactical genius oga goodjoe nice to have you
Our madam in the house too Safarigirl we should seeing more of you now that BBN has finished .

No be BBN matter keep me away.

I have generally been away from Nairaland. Stopped watching BBN weeks before the show even ended.

I get work wey I dey do. NL is just occasional for me, these days

drDoom3:


Many highly respected members of this thread even said, and I quote, "Ekong is the only defender assured of his starting spot, Balogun, Semi Ajayi, Omeruo and Awaziem will fight for the other spot".

I don't know how some people watch football though, but as for me, I have never seen Ekong play good football as a defender. His game is just aimless clearances and wild tackles. Ekong as a defender is not disciplined enough to start in any Bundesliga club.

Exactly....I wonder how you are a professional footballer and you are not comfortable with the same ball on ur feet!

Rohr has always been Rohr, his team set up was poor, yet, there was no tactical change from him to attempt stirring the tides in his favor. It was more like; play just the way you like insha Allah, we may get a goal.

We lacked presence in the midfield. Ajayi and Onyeka are just aren't up to it, why was Azeez not invited please?

Akpeyi may be a better goalie than Maduka, but Maduka gives you confidence, and that, most time is enough. One moment he impressed me was when he caught a through pass with his body outside the box but the ball still in box, reminds me of Akpeyi's howler against Argentina. He deserves to be at least our number 2 with his showing today.

Ebuehi just coming back from a 2 year injury did relatively well, but simply wasn't at his best and playing against an in-form Benrahma didn't help his course that much. Zaidu was impressive too.

As long as Balogun is fit, he should always be playing abeg, till he decides to call it quits.

Tijani is A Star in the making, yes, I said it.

Overall, our problem was from the middle, we were unable to string up to 5 passes together. What makes matters even worse is, the Algerians weren't that spectacular, but, for their tactical discipline, they did enough to suppress us, their pressing was mad too.

BascoVanVeli:
too bad we are not playing in asaba because now there is no the pitch was bad excuse.

The pitch was bad though.

ChrisKels:


I hope he starts playing for his club, besides, the one chosen ahead of him by his club coach has been very very poor

True.

Why was Ramon azeez not invited?

Samueltemi337:
I nor understand why una go dey hype sanusi


That guy nor good


Ola Aina anyday anytime

abeg open your eyes next time make u watch Ball well.

kellycute:
abeg open your eyes next time make u watch Ball well.

Na so una matter dey be


I go still dey this thread when una go insult the guy


Collins first match na so una hype am


idowu too

Someone legit watched Sanusi today and believe he was poor?


Yeah he should do better with his crosses but man!! Nigga was up and down the Field in seconds

Really did well against Mahrez

Imo, had a better game than Ebuehi but sha, to each his own

Strong positive from this game is SANUSI. A mahrez was pocketed for almost his duration in the match before he was substituted . He understood his defensive duties and made important runs when necessary. Give the guy some respect. Collins or aina would have made mahrez shine

Icon4s:




Dude looked overwhelmed for the 20mins he played.

Boss na today you dey watch this game.

I don dey tell them here say those German boys would need to prove to us that they are better

Am always saying it that a fit Balogun is better than any of our CB.I never rate Ekong but Rohr rate him dearly.

Akpoguma would be good addition to eagles so we can't really say much of him now but fact still remains he is average CB just like Udohkahi

The real deal for eagles is Torunarigha,Iorfa and Adarabioyo.

My opinion

The team started poorly(Typical of this team). And Algeria did their homework on that and capitalized on it well.

Except for the shaky start, and early goal, the defense did creditably well. Balogun was my man of the match. The duo of Ekong and Ajayi also did ok. Sanusi did creditably well. Is he better than Aina? Too early to call, but now we know we have an extra man there. Ebuehi looked match rusty as he was mostly on the back foot against the Algerian number 20. Plus his crosses were poor. Akpoguma, looked overwhelmed. Looked like he had stage fright

Our Midfield was the weakest link, especially in the first half. Mikel Agu looked an improved player. Frank Onyeka did just fairly well in the first half, for a debutant but we really missed an Ndidi. Most of Iwobi's passes were not actually the best but his work rate was awesome. Samson Tijani Showed some little sparks of promise.

Chukwueze was our greatest threat going forward in the first half. Samuel Kalu was not his usual self, wasting chances all over. Simon brought in more pace and direct play but Musa looked like a player on the verge of retirement.

Onuachu, due to lack of good balls from the midfield struggled to make impact. Chances were few for him. Iheanacho came in an added more sense of urgency in the attack but the Algerian defense did a good job on him.

Maduka Okoye, started shaky, but improved as the game progressed.

We lost but there are some take homes from this game. Remember we played against the African champions.

We look forward to the Tunisia game.

Samueltemi337:
I still prefer ola Aina to sanusi

Ehh, come again

Samueltemi337:
Why was Ramon azeez not invited?

question for Rohr to answer