On Thursday, Jose Peseiro got a second chance to make a first impression.
His first two outings in the Super Eagles dugout had resulted in one-goal defeats, the tour of the United States full of lessons and making-do, but short on actual victories. If their nature allowed for some teething problems, the visit of Sierra Leone – modest in comparison to Mexico and Ecuador in terms of pedigree – demanded the team get cracking right from the off.
It seems, however, that habits take rather quickly, especially with a young, impressionable side. As against both Tricolours on the other side of the Pacific, Nigeria were slow out of the blocks in Abuja, although faced with the most unkind of playing surfaces, uncertainty underfoot cannot have been that much of a surprise.
As it were, it did not seem to hamper the visiting Leone Stars a great deal: they were quickly to the fore, immediately recognising where the space was. Their choice of amusement on the day was the leaden William Troost-Ekong, not so much weighed down by the captain’s armband as simply weighed down, seemingly running in quicksand and increasingly easy to dismiss as a factor.
By teasing Ola Aina up the pitch and playing quickly into the channel, John Keister’s side were able to make hay time and again. By the time Jonathan Morsay headed home Musa Kamara’s cross, Sierra Leone had already gotten two good looks.
The third saw them break from a set-piece, forcing Francis Uzoho – thankfully now less vulnerable to the low shot – to turn an effort onto the upright. Inside an empty Moshood Abiola Stadium, the sound of the ball ricocheting off the frame of the goal served as a useful wake-up call.
From then on, the hosts were the better side, at once more accepting of the peculiar challenge in front of them and more secure in their use of possession. Central to this was Alex Iwobi, who for the second match running was used as part of a midfield pairing (with Joe Aribo, who started the Europa League final as a striker a mere three weeks ago), and for the second match running displayed an ability to dictate the tempo of the match, thread the eye of the needle and get into the penalty area.
This was as complete a midfield performance as we have seen since, well, a certain John Mikel Obi was strutting his stuff at the heart of proceedings for Nigeria. It needed to be too: it was his equaliser that knocked the wind out of the plucky Sierra Leoneans, allowing the Super Eagles to come into the match and display their inherent superiority.
Which is not to say it was all plain sailing from there, of course. While, as Peseiro noted afterwards, the visitors only “had some good moments” again in the closing stages, there was plenty to ruminate upon still, not least of which was the inherent unworkability of his preferred midfield.
His decision to bring on Oghenekaro Etebo at the half was a tacit admission in that respect, but the lesson here is that, when it comes to casting the net wider for midfield reinforcement, urgency is required. As it happens, Etebo promptly got booked, a dead giveaway for his overall conditioning at this time, and became a non-factor as the game got stretched in the closing stages. Against any halfway serious opponent, a soft underbelly like this could have been punished a lot more ruthlessly.
It was also obvious how much improved Victor Osimhen was after the break, finally free from the responsibility of having to play off Umar Sadiq. Peseiro seems determined to make a two-striker set-up stick, but while both Cyriel Dessers and Terem Moffi have obvious deficiencies for a partner to shore up, here it just seemed like both strikers were getting in one another’s way.
Osimhen pounced at the end of the first half to put Nigeria ahead and maintain his international ratio of a goal every two matches, but it was after the restart that he seemed liberated, able to focus his efforts on the width of the penalty area and create panic more consistently. A lone ranger in the truest sense, somehow even more effective without a lolloping Tonto tagging along. (Which is not to say that Sadiq did badly, far from it.)
Having come in with an idea in his head, Peseiro’s success will ultimately come down to how quickly he learns his squad, but also how well he takes the lessons offered in the heat of battle. In the short term, however, it was crucial to start off on the right foot, and if there is one thing to be said for his brief stint so far, it is that there has been a pattern of improvement in the second halves of matches.
Now, if he could get it spot-on from the start…