In the Nigerian sports ecosystem football is everything. It is that important. The game is one of Nigeria’s biggest diplomatic and international relations tools.

The rest of the world may not consider the Under-17 FIFA World Cup competitions a big deal, but for us in this part of the world, it is, indeed.

More than ever before, we need these small victories to whet our appetites for the bigger pies in the global football marketplace.

I am happy that the federal government lavishly rewarded the victorious new Under-17 women’s world champions. Their success came at a time when the spirit of the Nigerian people, dampened by political tensions that hang like a noose around the neck of a condemned prisoner, needed to be lifted!

The manner of their well-earned victory in the final match against Japan lifted the spirit of the people as well as the image of the country.

Government’s reaction now serves as a great incentive and motivation for women and the girl-child in Nigeria. It also confirms that women can bring as much as the men in all fields to the table of development in Nigeria.

Flamingos’ Triumph Offers Lessons For Nigerian Football

As I told Aisha Falode, the veteran female sports journalist and outstanding football administrator, in my congratulatory message to her for her work in women’s football and contributions to Nigeria’s success, the women’s senior team, the Falcons, may be the biggest beneficiary of this ‘small’ step by the Flamingos. They will be challenged by this victory. They will adopt some of the outstanding players from this team and groom them for the immediate future. They will also take useful lessons from the technical and tactical strategies deployed to succeed at Under-17 to prepare adequately to become FIFA World Cup Champions in the next few years.

I predict that the Nigerian girls will win the FIFA World Cup before their male counterparts, the Super Eagles, do, inside the next 8 years! I can clearly see the pathway to achieve such a goal.

Nigeria must conduct a study of this recent victory. Within it, I see aspects once disregarded that made the difference between winning and losing big competitions.

Nigeria must tweak the architecture of its domestic football. The various parts of its football development are not moving in sync.

Super Eagles reassemble – no great expectations!

As I congratulate Nigeria and the Flamingos, my gaze shifts to the Super Eagles. They assemble this weekend for two matches against Tanzania. By the time you are reading this the home-match in Uyo, Nigeria, would have been played. The result is likely to be the same old story – Nigeria struggling to win in a match that ordinarily should be a walk-over. But the times have changed and Nigeria is not the powerhouse that she once was, or should be, in Africa.

I have looked at Eric Chelle’s latest invitees to the national team. It is largely the same old set of ‘soldiers’ with a sprinkling of new ones that will feature. To expect a massive shift from the disappointments of the recent past is to be foolish.

So, I have reduced my expectations, hope for success because I am a patriot, and look forward to a future of fresh ideas and new developments on how to re-set the buttons of leadership, establish a new path to genuine development, and set new goals that will eventually and realistically lead Nigeria to winning the World Cup within the next 8 years!

2026 CAF Awards – Nigeria Has Nominees, But Questions Remain!

The reality of the current state of Nigerian football has been brought to our doorsteps and stares us in the face.

The country will be hosting the 2026 CAF Awards, an annual event that celebrates the best of African football in players, coaches and clubs.

On December 2, the event will be globally showcased. While Nigeria has some representation among the nominees, the country’s presence on the shortlist remains limited.

Christiana Uzoma of Edo Queens is among the 10 nominees for the Women’s Goalkeeper of the Year award. Her teammate, Oluwakemi Adegbuyi, is also nominated for the Women’s Young Player of the Year award.

Beyond the individual categories, Nigeria is also nominated for the Women’s National Team of the Year award.

However, as of the time of writing, CAF was yet to publish the shortlists for seven award categories under the Women’s Club & Coaching and Officiating groups. The full extent of Nigeria’s representation in the awards, therefore, remains to be seen.

While these nominations deserve recognition, they also raise questions about the broader state of Nigerian football and its ability to consistently produce players, coaches and teams capable of competing for continental honours.

Nigeria is not producing the best players in the continent any more. There is something wrong with the production line.

Nigerian Football’s Talent Pipeline Under Threat

The entire country is now flooded with scouts and agents from Europe seeking cheap players for the thriving and expanding global player-recruitment business. In Africa, the business of selling young players has become more lucrative than running a proper professional football club.

The effect is that the domestic leagues are being fleeced and depleted of the best players that should come through the grassroots system (whatever that is).

Organised matches at the grassroots are outside the realm and control of the national football associations. They have become the rich farmlands where the fruits are harvested and taken away even before they are ripe.

What started as a harmless trickle in the early 1990s has become a menacing flood in the 2020s.

The foreign clubs, through their scouts and agents, do not look for the technically rounded players because they have them aplenty all over Europe in their club academies.

What they come to look for and take away are the football athletes, the runners, the fighters, the big and rugged players with the speed, the physique and the power to defend or power their way to score goals.

The effect of this is that they contaminate our natural football culture, and install a system that encourages Nigerian coaches to abandon their traditional methods of breeding players honed by difficult terrains and poor facilities, the football artists with exquisite dribbling skills, ‘sexy’ touches and silky moves on the ball, flair and flash exhibited on ragged fields where any tactical discipline and proper organisation are impossible to be instilled.

The result of this plunder is that Nigerian football, in all ramifications, suffers from the damage inflicted by the inordinate influx of European agents and scouts that have disrupted our own natural production line of exceptionally gifted players, and corrupted our coaches.

Nigeria must look at what a few African and South American countries have resorted to do in the face of this problem. Countries like Egypt, Brazil, Argentina, South Africa, even Cote D’Ivoire and Algeria continue to explore ways around the challenge.

Nigeria is not doing anything.
The country’s football administrators must wake up from their present slumber, put on their thinking caps and come up with solutions that will raise Nigerian football higher, or watch her sink and be doomed forever.

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