Gernot Rohr, the successful yet maligned former coach of Nigeria’s Super Eagles, now returns with Benin Republic to potentially end his former team’s 2026 World Cup hopes, proving the NFF’s decision to sack him was a catastrophic misstep.
It’s often said that time reveals all truths, and in the case of former Super Eagles coach Gernot Rohr, that revelation is poised to arrive on the pitch in Uyo this Tuesday. The narrative is almost too poetic: the coach unceremoniously sacked by the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) now stands one draw away from leading Benin Republic to their first-ever World Cup, simultaneously pushing Nigeria to the brink of elimination.
Looking back, the signs of Rohr’s capability were always there. He was the manager who qualified us for the 2018 World Cup with a game to spare, a feat that felt refreshingly straightforward. He was the architect of the blistering 4-0 thrashing of Cameroon, a performance that reminded us what a cohesive, well-drilled Nigerian team could achieve. Yet, as is the Nigerian way, naysayers persisted. The then-NFF President, Amaju Pinnick, justified the sacking by claiming Rohr had lost disciplinary control, a move the author succinctly critiques with the sharp Yoruba proverb: “it is awa wi, plucking excuses in the air to give the dog a bad name.”
The aftermath has been a masterclass in downfall. Under Rohr, we never failed to qualify for a World Cup. Since his departure, we missed Qatar 2022 and are now staring down the barrel for 2026. The “bunch of jokers,” as the author rightly labels the decision-makers, replaced him with a cycle of interim coaches who have driven the team into its current “listless debacle.”
Through it all, Rohr’s character has been unimpeachable. He has “never said a bad word about Nigeria,” maintaining a magnanimous professionalism that shames his former employers. Now, he returns not with vitriol, but with a well-organized Benin side that has already defeated us. Tuesday’s match is more than a qualifier; it’s a reckoning. A draw for Benin is a triumph; a win for Nigeria feels like a narrow escape from a fate we richly deserved. Whatever the outcome, one thing is clear: Nigerian football owes Gernot Rohr a long-overdue apology.