The Nigeria Football Federation on Friday responded to claims surrounding the resignation of Thomas Dennerby as head coach of the Nigerian women’s national football team, the Super Falcons.
Reports say Dennerby’s reasons for resigning included unfulfilled contractual obligations, among them unpaid wages, and a lack of cooperation and accommodation in the country.
The NFF, however, strongly denied that Dennerby was not accorded the necessary level as claimed.
“We want to put it on record that no Head Coach in the history of the Super Falcons has been afforded the level and readiness of support that has been provided (to) Mr. Dennerby by this Board,” the NFF said on its official Twitter account.
The NFF, though, admitted that one of the reasons Dennerby may have resigned was its refusal to grant his request to bring in additional coaching staff of a certain caliber.
“Perhaps, one of the reasons he left was because we did not accede to his request to bring in more expatriate coaches and an indigenous coach who do not have the required license,” the NFF said.
“If we had agreed to his request for more expatriate coaches, that would have left our indigenous coaches presently with the team in the lurch.”
60-year-old Dennerby, who was appointed in January 2018 to replace Florence Omagbemi, had a year left on his contract.
Dennerby led Nigeria to a ninth Women’s Africa Cup of Nations title in Ghana in 2018 and the round of 16 at the 2019 Women’s World Cup in France.
He sat out Nigeria’s last two games due to a dispute with the NFF and, according to the BBC, refused to show up for a reconciliation meeting.
Nigeria was knocked out of the 2020 Olympic qualifiers by Ivory Coast on the away goals rule in his absence.
