He remains one of Africa’s best defensive midfielders but Sunday Oliseh’s coaching career is far from being a success. With five losses from five games in his last coaching job with German Regionalliga team, SV Straelen, leading to his resignation via phone call, the former Juventus midfielder may have come to the end of his coaching career
Sunday Oliseh remains one of the best players to ever don the Super Eagles jersey and one of the best midfielders to have come out of Africa, but his coaching career hasn’t gone as successful.
His strongest managerial stint has been with Dutch club, Fortuna Sittard which he literally led to the Eredivisie from the Eerste Divisie but was sacked after a rancour with the management of the club.
He has also in the past worked with the Super Eagles where he spent less than a year before resigning.
Oliseh stayed out of coaching for a long time before accepting to coach Straelen two months ago but his short stint at the club didn’t end on favourable terms as he failed to win any league match with the club.
With five defeats in five games, the former Super Eagles coach announced his resignation via phone call after difficult two months in charge of the German Regionalliga club.
Oliseh announced his resignation after German Regionalliga team, SV Straelen lost for the fifth time in as many games.
Fortuna Düsseldorf II defeated Straelen 2-0 with Oliseh miffed by his players’ display. The announcement of his resignation followed the result as the team scored just once in five league games and conceded seven times, to the expected displeasure of the former Nigerian captain.
Oliseh, according to SV Straelen sporting website, announced his resignation after the defeat last Saturday. He is believed to have placed a call through to the President of the club, Hermann Tecklenburg and announced his decision.
The team’s major highlight under Oliseh was said to be a 4-3 loss to Bundesliga 2 side, St. Pauli.
Straelen’s Sporting Director, Kevin Wolze who has taken over the coaching duties of the team made the announcement to the players during Sunday’s training session.
“Sunday obviously had the feeling that the team could no longer be reached. We have to accept this decision. It doesn’t make sense to try to persuade him to continue,” said Wolze.
“Obviously things have changed in the meantime. We started the season with five defeats and are currently bottom of the table. In addition, the squad is standing. We will take the necessary time to find a suitable successor,” he concluded.
It would be recalled that Oliseh resigned from his duty post as Super Eagles job in a controversial manner via twitter, a development the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) described as ‘good riddance to bad rubbish’.
The spokesperson for the federation, Ademola Olajire, had said then: “Oliseh is gone and we have to move forward. As far as we are concerned, it is good riddance to bad rubbish. He is not the kind of person we thought he was.
“He went on YouTube to abuse Nigerians. The minister pleaded with the federation to allow him to remain in place for our next two matches. As you can see, he did not even wait for those matches.
Olajire said the NFF only heard of the resignation in the media as the coach was yet to send in any letter to that effect.
He had faulted Oliseh’s claim that the NFF violated the terms of his contract, challenging the coach to publish details of those aspects of his contract that were breached.
Oliseh resigned just over seven months after he was appointed.
The former national team captain, who announced his resignation on Twitter, said he took the decision due to the inability of the NFF to honour the terms of his contract.
“Due to contract violations, lack of support, unpaid wages, benefits to my players, assistant coaches and myself, I resign as Super Eagles Chief Coach,” he tweeted.
In a preceding tweet before announcing his resignation, Oliseh thanked Nigerians for the opportunity to serve as coach of the national team.
“I feel fortunate, blessed and eternally grateful for having the honour to play, captain and coach this great nation of ours, Nigeria.”
Oliseh, whose appointment was made with much fanfare by the NFF, soon started having problems with the executives of the federation over remuneration, match tactics and results.
His complaint about being owed was not well received by the NFF, which rather threatened to sanction him.
Oliseh also had challenges managing the players. An altercation between the coach and the team’s former captain and the country’s most capped goalkeeper, Vincent Enyeama, led to the goalie’s premature resignation from the team.
Apparently, the last straw for Oliseh was the woeful outing of the Super Eagles at the CHAN competition in Rwanda, where the team was eliminated in the first round.
Following widespread criticisms that greeted the team’s elimination, a Youtube video soon surfaced in which Oliseh lambasted his critics, referring to them as “insane”.
However, his last resignation with his German club is one too many which might have put paid to his coaching career.
