Festus 'Adegboye' Onigbinde (born March 5, 1938 in

Modakeke Modakeke is a town in Osun State, South West Nigeria Nigeria ( ), , ig, Naìjíríyà, yo, Nàìjíríà, pcm, Naijá , ff, Naajeeriya, kcg, Naijeriya officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a country in West Africa. It is sit ...

) is a Nigerian football manager.

Career

He coached Nigeria national team at the

2002 FIFA World Cup The 2002 FIFA World Cup, also branded as Korea Japan 2002, was the 17th FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial football world championship for men's national teams organized by FIFA. It was held from 31 May to 30 June 2002 at sites in South Korea ...

, an achievement he had already gotten, between 1982 and 1984. In 1984, Onigbinde took Nigeria into the final match of the 1984 Africa Nations Cup. Nigeria lost 1-3 to Cameroun in that match. Later in 1984, he took over as coach of Shooting Stars Sports Club in Ibadan and took the Club to the final of the Africa Club Champions Cup. They lost the finals to Zamalek of Egypt. Onigbinde took over the Nigerian national team after the sack of the coaching crew of Shuaibu Amodu following what was considered a disgraceful performance of the Super Eagles at the 2002 Africa Nations Cup. Onigbinde took a team that consisted largely of young and inexperienced players. But the Japan/

South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and sharing a Korean Demilitarized Zone, land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed ...

edition was the worst Nigerian performance in the

World Cup A world cup is a global sporting competition in which the participant entities – usually international teams or individuals representing their countries – compete for the title of world champion. The event most associated with the concept i ...

history: for the first time in this competition, Nigeria did not win a single match and was knocked out of the tournament in the first round. In the first game they lost 0-1 to

Argentina Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, t ...

, after a goal of

Gabriel Batistuta Gabriel Omar Batistuta (; born 1 February 1969) is an Argentine former professional footballer. During his playing career, Batistuta was nicknamed Batigol () as well as El Ángel Gabriel (; Spanish for ''Angel Gabriel''). Regarded as one of the ...

. In the second match, against Sweden, Nigeria lost 1-2 after leading 1-0, meaning the elimination of the World Cup. The third game was a goalless draw to

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe ...

. After the World Cup, some Nigerian players, like

Jay-Jay Okocha Augustine Azuka Okocha ( ; born 14 August 1973), commonly known as Jay-Jay Okocha, is a Nigerian former professional footballer who played as an attacking midfielder. He played 73 times for the Nigeria national team between 1993 and 2006, scorin ...

and

Julius Aghahowa Julius Efosa Aghahowa (born 12 February 1982) is a Nigerian former professional footballer who played as a striker. He was known for his pace and his back-flips when he scored goals. Aghahowa became the first foreign national outside the former ...

, criticized Onigbinde for nominating the wrong players. However, some of the players remained in the Super Eagles for many years. Onigbinde remains a highly respected Nigerian soccer tactician. He has served as CAF and FIFA Technical instructor. According to Onigbinde himself, on BBC Sport Online, Adegboye is not one of his original names: 'I dropped my baptismal name 'Festus' in 1960 through Nigeria's Daily Times newspaper and have been answering

o 'to' O, or o, is the fifteenth Letter (alphabet), letter and the fourth vowel letter in the Latin alphabet, used in the English alphabet, modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in ...

Adegboye Onigbinde...I discovered Festus didn't mean anything, so I changed to 'Adegboye', meaning 'a child born to reclaim a chieftaincy title'.

References

1942 births Living people Yoruba sportspeople Nigerian football managers 2002 FIFA World Cup managers Sportspeople from Osun State 1984 African Cup of Nations managers {{Nigeria-footy-bio-stub