Capítulo 738: Roaring Rohr
The ball thundered past Maduka Okoye’s outstretched hands and nestled in the top left side of the goal.
{GOAAAALLLLLLLLLLL!!!} the commentator who was no respecter of persons, screamed excitedly as the Cameroon team began celebrating their goal.
The stands was mostly filled with moans and groans as the Nigerians were in greater numbers for the game and there were probably not up to 100 Cameroonian fans in the whole stadium, however that did nothing to dampen the Cameroon players’ excitement.
They celebrated joyfully with each other for a few seconds before they began heading back to their half of the field.
While the Cameroon players were celebrating, Rohr used that time to dig into his players, fuming as he shouted at them to play more unselfishly like they did in training.
Finishing his berating with some encouragement and reminding the players that there was more than enough time for them to turn things around.
The game soon resumed shortly after and after going behind, the Nigerian players seemed to have toned down their selfish and egoistical style of play a little bit and were playing a bit better with themselves, however, despite managing to create a few good chances, the Cameroon team which seemed intent with holding on to their lead warded off every attack until the referee finally blew the halftime whistle.
The players of the two teams trudged off the field and into the tunnel, heading for the locker room and leaving the dissatisfied Nigerian fans to entertain themselves for the next fifteen minutes.
The Nigerian fans had clearly seen that their team had played a bit better after conceding, but that wasn’t enough for them and quite a few of them were already fuming.
For Nigerians who were especially hard to please, merely playing better was not enough to cut it.
They wanted goals.
They wanted to win.
And until those things started happening, they would stay dissatisfied and might even grow more displeased the further things went.
Some of the fans were already arguing among themselves and blaming the manager’s tactics and lineup selection, complaining to themselves that if the manager had fielded Jason and Osimen instead of Simon and Onuachu, they might have scored a few of the opportunities they had earlier in the game.
None of that mattered to the Nigerian players who were getting absolutely battered in the dressing room by the manager by their selfish play and terrible mistakes that had caused them to fall into a dangerous situation more than once.
“I’ve told you, you must play together as a team!”
“The midfielders hold the ball and find forwards to send the ball to and the forwards should get into dangerous positions and make the best of their chances,”
“The goal doesn’t have to be beautiful! This is professional football, not street soccer!” Rohr roared at the players.
After spending a good five minutes crashing out on the players, the old man brushed back his hair that had fallen all over his face when he was shouting and then went into the tactical aspects and adjustments that were to be made.
Regarding the lineups, nothing would be changed for the time being, but the manager repeatedly emphasized that he expected to see changes as soon as the second half began otherwise he would start reconsidering whether some names would be on the call-up list for the World Cup Qualifiers that would be coming up later in the year.
With words like that being thrown around, the players began to put aside the non-competitive spirit that they had brought into the game and they prepared to give it their all.
Who did not want to perform better on their national team after all?
They all did, but since they were trying not to outshine everyone else, there was definitely going to be problems.
Their intentions were not bad, it was their approach that was wrong.
They seemed to forget that football was a team sport and that because one person performed well didn’t mean that others would see the other members of the team as useless… of course that couldn’t apply if they were seating on the bench so they were doing their best to secure a place in the starting lineup.
That much was understandable, but Rohr didn’t care.
All he wanted to do was win.
Before the previous international break when he had gotten Jason to join the Nigerian national team, the supa eagles, there had been talks about him being sacked since the national team hadn’t been in good form recently despite qualifying for the AFCON.
After Jason joined them over the other countries wanting his signature and his instant impact in the team, those talks had died down a bit, but the manager knew he wasn’t out of danger yet.
Even right now, many fans watching the game were raging and clamoring for a newer coach who could handle the talent in their National team to be hired.
A couple more losses even in mere friendlies might be all it took for him to say goodbye to over half a million dollars annually.
It was a job without stress too as he barely managed over 10 games a year and that was when there were qualifications or an international tournament being held, otherwise he coached fewer games.
Who would want to lose a job like that?
For his sake, the players better start playing better and he wasn’t going to hesitate in making threats.
Either way, someone’s head would roll and he didn’t want it to be his.
In the cameroon team’s locker room, things were wholly different as the manager was mostly pointing out tactical mistakes the Nigerian players that they could make use of.
Since the Nigerian team was making quite a few mistakes all over the pitch, the Cameroon manager was getting happier that he had made his players play defensively while waiting for the chance to counter.
He emphasized carrying that same mentality into the second half.
“Stay behind the ball, defend tight, and if a chance to counter opens up, move quickly and shoot on sight. Don’t waste time looking for the perfect chance,”
“They have a stronger team and can hit us if we waste too much time on the ball and they can catch us off guard,”
“If a goal scoring chance comes, try to make use of it, but if it doesn’t come up I want you to defend this lead as best as you can,”
“Even if they manage to equalize, keep defending and waiting for the counter attack,” the cameroon manager emphasized to his players repeatedly.
Suddenly a hand went up as one of the defenders asked,
“Coach, what do we do if they bring that Jason guy on?”