Three minutes into the 1994 Africa Cup of Nations final in Tunis, Elijah Litana headed Zambia in front. Emmanuel Amunike levelled two minutes later. He scored again just after the break, and on 10 April 1994 Nigeria had a second continental title, their first away from home. On the bench sat Clemens Westerhof.

Clemens Westerhof	At a glance
Born	3 May 1940, Beek, Netherlands
Nigeria tenure	1989 to 1994
AFCON record	Runners-up 1990, third 1992, champions 1994
World Cup	USA 94: Group D winners, last 16
FIFA ranking peak	5th, April 1994
Before Nigeria	Vitesse, MVV, Feyenoord (assistant)
After Nigeria	Zimbabwe, Mamelodi Sundowns, Bush Bucks

A five-year project

The CV was thin. Westerhof had coached Vitesse Arnhem and MVV and worked as an assistant at Feyenoord, but he arrived in 1989 without a trophy to his name as a manager, and his first official game, a World Cup qualifier away to Cameroon, was lost.

Daniel Amokachi dates everything from there. “The 1994 success actually started in 1989 when Clemens Westerhof came in charge of the Nigerian national team,” he told CAF. The coach, he recalled, promised a first World Cup and a Nations Cup.

It came in steps. Nigeria lost the 1990 final 1-0 to hosts Algeria. Two years later in Senegal, Ghana beat them in the semi-final and they took bronze. That was progress, but the target Westerhof had set his players was still a first World Cup. Then the breakthrough. A 1-1 draw in Algiers settled a three-team final qualifying group with Ivory Coast and Algeria, and Nigeria went through on goal difference to reach a World Cup for the first time.

No other Eagles coach has stood on all three steps of the AFCON podium.

Discipline and friction

Augustine Eguavoen, captain in the Tunis final, remembers structure. “Under him we had five captains in the national team, the head captain and four assistant captains,” he told ThisDay in 2016. “All of us that passed through Westerhof tried to emulate his style of management.”

Westerhof enforced it himself. “I sat all night to ensure that no player sneaked out. I did it because I wanted to win,” he said of one qualifying trip.

Harmony was another matter.

Rashidi Yekini never hid that the relationship was cold. Selection was blunt too: Fanny Amun, coach of the 1993 Golden Eaglets, says he had an agreement that several of his world champions would go to America, and GoalBall has covered why Kanu, Babayaro and Taribo were left out. Even Amunike, by Vanguard's account, had spent most of the Tunis tournament on the bench before his chance finally came against Zambia. Voetbal International later reported a row with senior players over wives at the team hotel on the eve of the Italy game.

USA 94

The 1994 World Cup squad opened with a 3-0 win over Bulgaria. Argentina won 2-1 after Samson Siasia had scored first. A 2-0 win over Greece put Nigeria top of Group D.

Italy waited. Amunike scored in the 26th minute, Gianfranco Zola was sent off, and the Eagles were about 90 seconds from the quarter-finals when Roberto Baggio equalised and then won it with an extra-time penalty. Westerhof's substitutions were picked apart at home and in the Dutch press.

He left soon after.

The ranking told the story. Nigeria had climbed to fifth in April 1994, still the Super Eagles' highest position. “We played the slickest football in 1994 and till date, people still reminisce about it,” Amokachi said.

After Nigeria

Quieter years followed.

He coached Zimbabwe from 1998 to 2000, had a spell at Mamelodi Sundowns, worked as a technical director in Harare and took Bush Bucks in 2004. In 2005 he ruled himself out of a return to the Eagles.

The bond with his players lasted, and so did their respect. Eguavoen ranked him as the most successful manager Nigeria has had, with Keshi next. When Stephen Keshi, his old captain, took Nigeria to Brazil 2014, Westerhof told Vanguard: “It is an honour to me that my former captain is now the coach of the national team.” He was asked about the gap in numbers too, and said that in his days there were perhaps 10 or 12 Nigerians playing abroad, whereas by 2014 “they are in hundreds.”

The state was slower. In May 2019 Babatunde Fashola, then works and housing minister, handed him the title deeds to a Gwagwalada apartment promised 25 years earlier. “It is unfortunate that this is a promise that has taken us so long to redeem,” Fashola said. Westerhof answered that he could now “feel myself more of a Nigerian.”

Our view

Westerhof turned 86 in May and lives in Arnhem. On Saturday Vanguard reported that he is critically ill in Rijnstate Hospital after a colon cancer diagnosis, his wife Lilian saying he “wants to live” and asking for prayers.

Every coach since has been measured against him. A final, a bronze, a title and a World Cup knockout tie in five years is a standard no successor has matched.

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