Ex-international, Waidi Akanni, has hit hard on the Super Eagles manager, Genort Rohr, for shutting the door against home-based players in the forthcoming World Cup qualifiers, saying this is not the norm in football all over the world.

Rohr was quoted as saying that home-based players must first distinguish themselves in CHAN team, (which he referred to as Eagles team B) before they could earn a call up to Super Eagles team A dominated by foreign-based players.

Akanni described Rohr’s conjecture as arrant nonsense saying it is not the practice in football in any part of the world.

“You cannot decide the fate of players without giving them the opportunity to showcase their talents. I think Rohr should have given the players equal opportunity to prove themselves before picking his team.”

Commenting on recently concluded AFCON qualifiers, Akanni said he could not use the matches to assess the team because the opposition was weak.

He stressed that Rohr should not have invited such numbers of foreign-based players to prosecute such games because of the quality of the opponents.

“I expected 40% local players in that team because we needed just a point to qualify for the Nations Cup. I will like to encourage the players to be serious with the World Cup qualifier and give their best.”