1. They are both forces to reckon with in football in their respective continents; South America and Africa.
2. No world cup will be complete without them.
3. They each have an abundance of footballing talent.
4. They have each excelled in world football at junior level.
In terms of pedigree however, they can still be said to be miles apart. While Argentina has won 2 senior world cups, Nigeria has never gone past the second round.
Encounters between the two nations show that Argentina is superior. Only once, in the 1996 Olympics soccer final, did Nigeria win.
At the moment, what is similar about both nations is that they are both perilously close to not qualifying for the SA mundial. Why? Because of wrong choices of managers.
Argentina's mistake is more horrific, but may be easier to address. They stubbornly (and i think stupidly) decided to chose Diego Maradona as Manager. For them, it was not enough to exalt a man who found it hard to manage his life into a living god. They had to make him manager of one of soccer's most reputable teams!
The above being said, the argentines should still be able to make South Africa next year if they SACK MARADONA NOW! I'm sure, any average coach will be better than Diego, considering the array of talent at Argentina's disposal. Any attempt to retain the man will mean disaster for the team, who are yet to get an impressive result since he took charge.
For Nigeria, the decision to saddle Amodu with the task of taking Nigeria to SA 2010 was not outrightly senseless, considering the failure and near indifference of his predecessor Berti Vogts, who was the foreign coach everybody in Nigeria had expected so much from, all to no avail. His blatant failure put too much unhealthy pressure on the Nigerian Football Federation to settle for a Nigerian Manager. Unfortunately, they chose the second best option when only the best option could have been good enough. Among Nigerian coaches, only Samson Siasia, who had groomed the 2005 Under 21 and 2008 Olympics finalists, demonstrated the character and attitude to be expected of a world class manager.
Shuaib Amodu, as one of Nigeria's more experienced coaches, had some pedigree, but not enough to make the Super Eagles once again one of Africa's very best teams, which they needed to be in order to beat Tunisia (who had not failed to qualify for the world cup since 1998) to the world cup ticket.
As could be expected, Amodu and a significant spectrum of Nigerians over celebrated the apparently excellent record of the Super Eagles in the 1st round of the qualifiers, where did not encounter any really strong opposition.
The only fairly impressive result of the eagles in the first round was perhaps the lone goal away victory over the South Africans, a result that did not reflect actual play.
Nigeria's lone goal away friendly victory over France did not actually help matters. It is only in a match with points at stake that a teams weaknesses and strengths are fully brought to the fore.
In Nigeria's last two world cup qualifying matches, they drew 0-0 with Tunisia away, and 2-2 at home in Abuja. Thus, the Super Eagles remain 2 points behind Tunisia with only 2 matches to go. Qualification for South Africa 2010 is no longer in Nigeria's hands. The goalless away draw was celebrated as though victory in the return was guaranteed, which it turned out not to be. Under Amodu, Nigeria failed to appreciate that the surest way to qualify for the mundial was to beat Tunisia on their home soil (which the burkinabes had done earlier) in order to have a one point advantage before the match in Abuja.
Unfortunately for Nigeria, unlike the argies, removing the current manager would not improve their chances. Let's hope the Argentines would do the world cup a favour by removing Maradona before his legend is finally destroyed at home!
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