The Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) has confirmed that the appointment of Bruno Labbadia as the head coach of the Super Eagles has been canceled due to strict regulations imposed by German tax authorities.
Thank you for reading this post, don't forget to subscribe!As a result, the NFF has announced that Technical Director Augustine Eguavoen will take over as head coach for the upcoming 2025 Africa Cup of Nations qualifying matches against Benin Republic on September 7th in Uyo and Rwanda on September 10th in Kigali.
This will mark Eguavoen’s fourth time leading the three-time African champions, having previously held the position from 2005 to 2007, in 2010, and again in 2022.
In a statement released on Friday, NFF President Ibrahim Gusau explained that the federation could not cover the substantial tax obligations tied to Labbadia’s salary, which was not part of the initial agreement.
“We have been dealing with the tax issue for the past three days, and I made it clear to him that there is no way the NFF can agree to cover the additional tax percentage on his salary demanded by the German tax authorities,” Gusau said. “It’s simply not feasible for us to bear an extra cost, ranging from 32% to 40% of his salary, on top of the agreed monthly wage.”
Gusau added that the NFF and Labbadia had reached an agreement in principle, but the tax concerns were not addressed during the initial discussions. While the NFF attempted to be flexible, Labbadia insisted that the federation should cover the full tax amount, leading to an impasse.
The NFF had initially announced on Tuesday that they had reached an agreement with Labbadia to become the Super Eagles head coach. If the deal had gone through, Labbadia would have been the sixth German to manage the Super Eagles, following in the footsteps of Karl-Heinz Marotzke, Gottlieb Göller, Manfred Höner, Berti Vogts, and Gernot Rohr.
