Ethiopia Nigeria-anology of a rivalry

Coach Sewnet Bishaw was smiling after Ethiopia’s workout yesterday. Despite reducing the team’s workload in fear of over training them, he must have been still happy at what he saw from his sweating foals.
Happy as well as confident because the normally reserved helmsman, now issued his sternest of warnings to the African champion when he told supersport.com "We don't only want to beat them in Addis but we want to give them a football lesson and kill them off."
It’s as if there exists bad blood between the two nations and to some it actually does. Let’s go down Memory lane.
Ethiopia costing Nigeria two valuable points in Addis the last time the two teams met there - to many an expert - is the real reason Nigeria did not make it to the Equatorial Guinea/Gabon Afcon. That draw put the Eagles in the precarious position of not just beating Guinea, but doing so by a certain number of goals in her last game. She failed and for the first time in three decades was not invited to Africa’s biggest party. To return the favour, two late penalties by Victor Moses now saw Nigeria expel Ethiopia at the last Afcon in South Africa herself, leaving many an Antelope fan furious and bitter.



Nigeria fans Getty Images 

But even before then there was commotion. This brings us to the notorious “bread game” that involved Paul Hamilton's Flying Eagles, who eliminated their Ethiopian counterparts en route USSR '85 U-19 World Cup finals. The story is that during pre-match formalities before the first leg of this African qualification tournament semi-final kicked off in Lagos, the Ethiopian lads offered The Flying Eagles a live chicken each. While it was a gesture of open warmth as we now know, fearing black magic then, the hosts turned the offer down flatly and proceeded to hammer the East Africans 3-0. The Ethiopians were embittered by the rejection and returned home with tales of wicked Nigeria fans taunting them with loaves of bread throughout the match - in cruel reference to the ongoing famine in the rebellious Oromo and Tigre regions of Ethiopia which the Dictator Mengistu Haile Mariam's scorched earth policies had created. The incident is yet to be substantiated locally and till today is denied vehemently by the NFF.
What can be substantiated is that the Addis Ababa crowd exacted vengeance on Paul Hamilton's team during the return leg when they not only entered the stadium with loaves of bread themselves, but also assaulted the players after the match, which ended 1-1. Monday Odiaka and Mark Anunobi talked about having crouched into fetal positions while being beaten. In fact Nigeria was trapped in the dressing room for several hours and had to barricade the dressing room doors against attempts at forcible entry, and were unable to leave until the crowd had dispersed.
And that is how things have been left smoldering till now.