Former Super Falcons head coach, Randy Waldrum, has questioned the Nigeria Football Federation’s (NFF) management of the funds provided by FIFA for the team’s preparation for the 2023 Women’s World Cup in Australia and New Zealand.
Waldrum’s team was eliminated in the second round by England through a penalty shootout. But the American coach alleged in a viral video on X that his team was handicapped by the NFF’s failure to release the funds needed to properly prepare for the tournament.
He claimed that the NFF received $960,000 from FIFA in October 2022 to support the Super Falcons’ preparation for the World Cup.
He said: “I have a close contact here in the US who is very connected with some members of the FIFA board. This person told me that in October, every country was given $960,000 from FIFA to prepare for the World Cup. Where is that money?
“If Nigeria got that money, why didn’t we have a camp in November? We went to Japan, flew in, played the game, and went home. Some of our players didn’t arrive until the morning of the game. I think five players who were supposed to start for me arrived the night before, and the game was at 4:00 p.m. They had travelled 16 hours by plane. We played Japan and then went home. We wasted the remaining five days of that window that should have been used for training.”
Waldrum affirmed that FIFA provides financial support to federations that cannot afford business-class travel, with deductions made from their World Cup earnings.
According to him, the NFF had no justification for the suboptimal logistics. “So, all these questions I have are about where this money is. And the other thing I found out through my FIFA contacts is that if countries don’t have the money to buy business-class tickets for everyone, FIFA will fund it and simply deduct the cost from the federation’s World Cup earnings.
“So there’s no excuse to say there was no money to buy tickets or to hold training camps. These are the kinds of things Nigerians don’t question. In the US, they would be questioned. If the US Soccer Federation did the same thing, they would have to answer for it.”
The coach also faulted the NFF for failing to maximise FIFA-approved staffing provisions, noting that while FIFA allows up to 22 technical staff members, Nigeria travelled with only about 11.
“So, if FIFA will pay bonuses for up to 22 staff members, why didn’t we have 22? I didn’t have an analyst or a scout. The US has scouts in Europe watching teams in friendly matches in case they meet them at the World Cup,” he explained.
“We didn’t even have scouts with us in Australia. I didn’t have anyone to scout games. If we had progressed beyond the group stage, I still wouldn’t have had anyone to scout matches in other groups. Everything I did was from videos and whatever information I could find online.”
