Randy Waldrum, Super Falcons coach, will kiss his job goodbye if his team lose to the Lioness of England in their round of 16 clash of the FIFA Women’s World Cup on Monday, Iwitnesslive can report.
Our correspondent learnt that the Nigeria Football Federation had reached a decision to show the coach an exit door regardless of how far his team go in the competition and could wield the big stick immediately after the match against England should Falcons crash out on Monday.
Falcons’ build-up to the tournament was fraught with a feud between Waldrum and his employers as the coach accused the federation of not supporting the team enough.
He alleged the NFF was trying to impose players on him and questioned why the football house failed to pay his players their outstanding bonuses and allowances despite collecting huge money from FIFA for women’s football.
The federation through its Media Director Demola Olajire fired back at the coach accusing him of incompetence.
“Waldrum will go even if he wins the World Cup; the decision not to renew his contract has already been taken by the NFF and the coach knows this,” a source in the federation told our correspondent.
However, the NFF President Ibrahim Gusau on Wednesday confirmed that the coach’s future would be decided after the World Cup.
“The coach has a contract, so after the World Cup, we will look at the terms of his contract and make a decision on the next step to take,” he told Brila FM in an interview monitored by our correspondent on Wednesday.
NFF hired Waldrum in 2021 and his contract is expected to end after the World Cup.
Meanwhile, the NFF said the players are no longer entitled to match bonuses from the World Cup following the adoption of a new payment model by FIFA.
FIFA announced that it would pay all the players participating in the competition directly instead of routing the process through their federations, a decision that has been praised by many pundits.
Gusau said although the federation had agreed to give Falcons 30 percent of the participation fee but the new directive from FIFA had invalidated the agreement.
“We don’t have any issue with the players. In the first instance, we agreed with them that we would pay then match bonuses when we receive appearance fees. We promised to give them 30 percent. Later on, FIFA came up with a new model of payment; they decided to take part of the money that is due to the federations and pay the players directly.
“So we sat with the players based on the new development even before they left our shores for Australia and explained to them that the old arrangement was now invalid. It is to the players’s advantage now and all parties agreed,” he said.
The players allegedly threatened to boycott the tournament because of the outstanding bonuses but Gusau said the arrers would be cleared as soon as the federation received payment from FIFA.
“Some of the concerns raised about bonuses are what was owed the players as far back as two years ago. We will settle this outstanding fee the moment we get our money from FIFA.
