A former Super Eagles coach, Adegboye Onigbinde, on Wednesday advised the team’s coach, Stephen Keshi, to remain steadfast and committed to the team’s success at the 2014 World Cup. The veteran coach also condemned the unfriendly relationship some members of the Nigeria Football Federation have with Keshi.

Onigbinde told the News Agency of Nigeria in Lagos that he condemned the frosty relationship between Keshi and the Nigeria Football Federation.

He said, “The issue is that some people in the NFF are not comfortable with Keshi leading the country to its fifth appearance at the World Cup. You can’t have it all rosy when handling a huge national assignment like the World Cup.

“Although, they are your employers, you owe Nigerians a duty to do well in Brazil.”

The former Eagles coach said that it was unfortunate that there were plans by some people to put their personal interests above national interest.

“The issue at hand is a national one and should be treated with utmost good fate devoid of self-serving,” Onigbinde said.

Even though a high number of the public believe that the Eagles’ coach and his employers don’t have very cordial relationship, the NFF says it is not true. On Tuesday the General Secretary of the Federation Musa Amadu reiterated at a press conference in Abuja that Keshi and the federation members enjoy very good relationship.

The Confederation of African Football instructor who asked Keshi to handle the situation with maturity, refused to comment on the issue of appointing a foreign assistant for the team. The matter came to the front burner earlier in the year but the Federation denied the plan was ever on their sleeve.

As the world football body continue to run the countdown to the 2014 World Cup, the goal miss by Nigeria striker Yakubu Ayegbeni at the 2010 finals in South Africa was one of the major highlights from FIFA on Wednesday. FIFA, which marked the 64 days to the World Cup on Wednesday, ran the photo of the Yakubu missed goal against South Korea via their twitter handle. Yakubu missed an open-goal against Korea to help end Nigeria’s ambition at the 2010 World Cup. The miss, which went viral on the internet afterwards, also marked the attacker’s exit from the Eagles.

FIFA highlights major incidents from the past World Cup on daily basis as part of the countdown process.

Brazil 2014 will hold from June 12 to July 13 with Nigeria playing the group stage against Argentina, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Iran.

-Punch