Nigeria's World Cup preparations have been thrown into disarray amid claims and counter-claims of missing payments to players and coaching staff.
Drawn alongside Vera Pauw’s Ireland, hosts Australia and Canada in Group B, Nigeria have been an ever-present side at the World Cup but a chaotic build-up threatens to derail their campaign before it even begins.
American manager Randy Waldrum hit out at the Nigerian Football Federation (NFF) in a recent interview on the On The Whistle podcast where he claimed both he and the players have gone unpaid for months at a time.
"Up until about three weeks ago, I had been owed about 14 months’ salary," Waldrum said on the podcast.
"Then they paid seven months’ salary. We still have players that haven’t been paid since two years ago, when we played the summer series in the USA. It’s a travesty.
"In the two and a half years that I have been here [in Nigeria], I have never had one time that the Federation came to me and asked: 'What do you need, coach?’"
A feature of this year's World Cup is that FIFA have pledged to pay every single player at the tournament a minimum of $30,000.
To that end, each competing nation have been given almost $1 million to disperse to those travelling to Australia, but Waldrum claims that the NFF have not made that money available to players.
"I’m not going to be quiet any more," he said. "In October, every country was given $960,000 from FIFA to prepare for the World Cup. Where is that money?"
Nigeria’s players have threatened to boycott their World Cup opener against Canada over missing payments after six senior players captain Onome Ebi, Rasheedat Ajibade, Asisat Oshoala, Ohale Osinachi, Tochukwu Oluehi and Desire Oparanozie led a meeting upon the team’s arrival in Australia.
NFF communications director Ademola Olajire appears to have further inflamed the row, suggesting that the money from FIFA has been spent on travel for the team to play friendlies and a training camp, while also launching an extraordinary broadside on manager Waldrum.
"Everyone knows FIFA pays preparation money for every team going to the Women’s World Cup," Olajire said.
"The team travelled to Japan to play matches, travelled to Mexico for a tournament and travelled to Turkey to play matches. The team is presently having a training camp in the Gold Coast ahead of the World Cup. Is it ‘Mr Blabbermouth’ Waldrum who has been paying?
"He claims he’s been at the job because of the players. B******s. His entire objective has always been to add leading a team at the World Cup to his CV. [He is the] worst coach to have handled the Super Falcons of Nigeria, by a country mile."
Ireland are due to play Nigeria on 31 July.
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