Former coach of the national team, Christian Chukwu has welcomed the unbanning of the Eagles by President Goodluck Jonathan and said it was good news to all Nigerians and particularly, the  youth whose careers have been saved.

Speaking from his Enugu base on telephone, the former skipper of the 1980 Africa Cup of Nations winning Green Eagles said, “I have to thank the President. This has shown that he is a listening president who want us to settle our problems internally, without involving FIFA.

Chukwu said the next step now is for all stake holders to sit down to know where the problem lied. “We need to go back to the grassroots. We cannot continue like this, why do we do well at the age-grade level and would not do well at the senior level.

“Happily, if the problem is those who run our football, with the impeachment of Lulu, Uchegbulam and Ogunjobi, a fresh opportunity has been created for people to file in their papers for election. It is now open. Before, it was only Lulu and the others,” Chukwu said.

Speaking in the same vain, former NFA chairman, Kojo Williams said he was pleased about government’s decision. “The first decision was not good for the country, but we need to tackle this problem from three key areas,” he said, pointing out that the areas include scouting, training of the kids and coaching. “And we need to take a serious look at the state of our league.”

Said he, “we need to set up a coaching structure because we don’t have good coaches; we need a coaching philosophy which would be internalised by the kids before they graduate to intermediate and senior levels.”

He contended that “to get it right at the senior level, the juniors must first get it right when they graduate to the senior level.”