John Fashanu has accused a former Super Eagles Coach of demanding a bribe to feature for the National team.
Explaining the reasons behind his choice at the time, the former England forward admitted that, Coaches demanded bribes from him, but refused to call them out.
“I said I wouldn’t name the Coach, but I said that you can start with Otto Gloria. I said it is down to you to find out when I came.”
“You look at the date and you’ll see who the Coach was. I don’t want to put the Coach in a bad situation. I wouldn’t want to do that to anybody. Like I said to Big Segun when we spoke, It is not something which is new, this goes on all the time; everywhere,” he told brila.net in an exclusive interview.
The two-capped ex England player stressed further that the Coaches in charge of the team at the time denied him his dream debut for Nigeria because he was unwilling to pay the bribe.
“I had only just signed on as a professional footballer when I came into Nigeria, the late MKO brought me to play matches. I came the first time the Coach asked me the specific amount. I can’t remember whether it was 1 million Naira exactly, whatever, but they asked me which I could not do. I went back home again, I didn’t even play, I wasn’t even a substitute.”
“They then brought me back again after four months, yet again the Coach asked me for a certain amount of money I couldn’t pay.
“Now if he had not asked me I would have played and if I didn’t want to play for my country I would never have come a third time.
“The third time I came, and that’s when he told me, look, Yoruba boys don’t like you, you don’t speak your language, Hausa boys don’t like you and Ibo boys don’t understand you, why don’t you go back to England?
“That’s what he told me the Coach, go back to England you’re not bringing cash.
“And I was not bringing cash because the truth was I didn’t have any money. ”
“So, it was a year later when I now transferred and I now started to play for England, and that was because I was exhausted coming back and every time I came back I was having different experiences.
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“And that’s just actually the truth, ” he concluded.
This article was most recently revised and updated 3 years ago
