How Nigeria lost Eberechi Eze to England – Ex-Manchester City star Onuoha reveals

Former Manchester City defender Nedum Onuoha has revealed that Nigeria lost Arsenal star Eberechi Eze to England due to the Nigeria Football Federation’s (NFF) sluggish approach to recruiting dual-nationality players, Afrik-Foot reports.

​Eze, who has Nigerian parents, is currently one of the brightest stars in English football. It was due to his stellar five-year stint at Crystal Palace, he got a high-profile €69.3 million move to Arsenal last summer.

His rise to stardom, combined with the occasional lack of creativity in the Super Eagles’ midfield, has left many Nigerian fans rueing his decision to represent the Three Lions of England instead of his motherland.

​However, there was a time when it seemed certain he would don the green and white. In fact, he briefly did.

​How Eberechi Eze Nearly Played For Nigeria

​Many Nigerian football fans will remember the famous photograph of a young Eberechi Eze in a Super Eagles kit alongside Alex Iwobi and former NFF President Amaju Pinnick.

Eberechi Eze has been called up to the senior England team for their Euro 2024 qualifiers next month. The Crystal Palace midfielder had been linked with Nigeria. He trained with the Super Eagles after being courted by former NFF president Amaju Pinnick and coach Gernot Rohr. pic.twitter.com/ldyl4k6mJi

— Lolade Adewuyi (@Jololade) May 24, 2023

​At the time, Eze was a rising star at QPR. Pinnick had invited several talented dual-nationality prospects to the Super Eagles camp—not necessarily to play immediately, but to give them a feel for the setup and gradually integrate them into the national team. Unfortunately, the strategy failed to stick, and Eze eventually committed his international future to England.

​Why Eze Snubbed the Super Eagles

​Just months after his brief stint in the Nigerian camp, Eze began moving through the English youth ranks, eventually making his senior debut for the Three Lions in 2023. This effectively ended any possibility of him representing Nigeria.

​Nedum Onuoha, who was Eze’s teammate at QPR during that period, shares a similar background. A dual citizen of Nigeria and England, Onuoha never played for the Super Eagles—a decision he now admits he regrets. In a recent interview with All Out Football, he criticized the NFF’s recruitment style as ineffective and blamed it for the loss of talents like Eze.

​”I regret not playing international football, and if I’d had the chance to do it for Nigeria, I know how much it would have meant to people like me,” Onuoha said. “But the decisions I made at the time felt right; perspectives change as you get older.”

​Reflecting on the systemic issues, Onuoha said: “I don’t know what it’s like now, but back then, I’d played in the Premier League for two years before England called me up for the U20s. Nigeria could have called me at any point during that time, but they didn’t.”

​He then stated how effortless the English recruitment felt by comparison: “I got my British passport at 15. A few years later, a letter just turned up at the club reception. The secretary said, ‘Oh, you’ve got this.’ It said I was being picked up on Sunday to play for England and to bring my passport. That wasn’t a difficult decision; it was just something that happened.”

​NFF’s “Too Little, Too Late” Approach

​Onuoha believes the NFF’s failure to scout players at a younger age is the root of the problem.

​”I played with Ebere at QPR when he first arrived. Within his first year or two, there was an optional training camp for potential Nigerian players at Fulham. He signed himself up for it, but he hadn’t played for any Nigerian youth teams. You just gathered him for that one event,” Onuoha explained.

​”He is one of the best talents in Europe right now. Nigeria could have had him if their recruitment system for younger players was better. They always seem to turn up just a bit too late. Nigeria has a great record at the U17 and U20 World Cups, but most of those players aren’t the ones based in England.”

​To Onuoha, if Eze had been scouted and integrated into the Nigerian youth setups earlier, he would have developed a stronger sense of belonging, making it harder for him to walk away.

Eze joins a growing list of world-class talents like Bukayo Saka, Carney Chukwuemeka, Noni Madueke, and Michael Olise who have chosen to represent European nations over Nigeria.