Following Rivers United failure to qualify for the group stage of the CAF Champions League after losing 4-3 on aggregate to Al Merreikh of Sudan last weekend, the club lost about $550,000 which they would have earned had they qualified for the group stage of the competition.
According to one of the fans who spoke on condition of anonymity,many factors like intimidation,poor selection,technical ineptitude, and lack of cohesion on the part of the team led to their exit.
“Rivers United lost in Sudan due to so many factors. The coach failed to listen to the advise of the Rivers State Sports Commissioner, NFF officials who told him not to be defensive. They told him to field his best players and to be offensive. Sadly,on match day he decided to get defensive. He also fielded Femi Thomas who was jittery instead of the more experienced Rotimi Sunday. This action backfired as the team conceded two cheap goals. The goalkeeper caved in under intimidation by the Sudanese fans who employed every tactics to harass the players. He could not communicate with his teamates,so he conceded two quick goals in the early minutes.
Also,the coach decided to parade only one attacker and ended up conceding three goals which created confusion in the team. Why the coach abandoned his technical duties and busied himself with accomodation,buying of water and other things was unexplainable. Maybe he was also distracted as he could not face his primary assigment . We were all suprised that he fielded players without courage.
Can you imagine how pained the commissioner was that the players the coach fielded were not the best. It’s so unfortunate that the club lost the services of some fantastic players who refused to join the team due to the attitude of the coach.
The players and officials wept due to the huge revenue they lost in CAF pay and what they would have gotten from allowances and bonus.
Meanwhile, there are indication that the coach could be relegated as the management plans to strengthen the coaching crew with an experienced coach coming on board.
Rangers also crashed out of the competition,losing to Zamalek of Egypt.