Football has been the most popular sport in Nigeria since anyone can remember. Ever since the victory in the Under-17 FIFA World Championship (now known as World Cup) in China 1985, the state has never been regarded with the same eyes anymore in the sport. We are currently rated 39th in the global football today. There are more than 50 international recognized players from Nigeria in Europe. All with very interesting and distinct stories about how they made it to their current positions.
But it is not made players that are my focus today; it is the grassroot players (the champions-in-the-making) and the toils they have to undergo before they can realize their dreams from the opportunities presented to them.
The problems still remain the same dirty streak that has been prevalent in most of my posts. Corruption, nepotism and indifference. Ever since the 20th century that introduced to the world legends of football from Nigeria like Kanu Nwankwo, Jay-Jay Okocha and Stephen Keshi (R.I.P) there has been a lag in the progress of national football because of the lack of true talents among our ranks today.
From my findings, talent is not enough to get you to the big leagues. You need to have the money, you need to have the connections and support. So, what about people that don’t have access to these things? Fraudsters guise as freelance scouts looking out for young players giving them hope, but only to force them to realize some money that they can steal and disappear with.
Meeting one of such young players you come to see how real the struggle is. There is nothing more frustrating than putting you all into something, only to be overlooked because you do not come from the same village with the person who has the power to put you where you are supposed to be.
The Nigerian leagues are not the ambition of any young Nigerian footballer. This is obviously because of the lack of standard in terms of welfare, transport and funding. It is near madness to owe players that are putting hard work into entertaining people and realizing another man’s dreams.
The cliché scenario is when people save up a lot of money and travel out of the country (usually to England) to see if they can be try make it into trials in the hopes of being spotted and recruited. This is nearly always futile because of racism, discrimination and stark bad luck.
It is safe to say that there are a few good football academies like Emmanuel Amunike’s Football Academy in Lagos and Diamond Academy in Umuahia, Abia state. But before you can be considered to be able to join these academies you need to have a profile. And to get a profile as a young player it usually means having to represent your country in one of the major tournaments (World Cup or Cup of Nations). If you’re lucky enough to be spotted by the team scout, then you can be allowed to play under trial.
Before one can build their profile, you have to play for your country. Unfortunately, almost all true talents don’t make it because they have to pay travel fees by themselves or even worse: all the available spaces have been bought out. The government doesn’t help. I heard of a young player who was asked to raise 500,000 naira within the space of 2 days to be able to represent his country. He couldn’t do it, and all his days of training has been flushed down the drain.
It should also be considered the squalor of living in some substandard academies. Lack of health care, lack of proper training, lack of food. Although some of these academies provide a home and a hope for many of the young ballers, they should live up to a certain standard because whether they like it or not it is a matter of life and death.
WHAT IS THE SOLUTION?
I would have said, ideally, that a fund should be raised by the government to see to the sponsoring of extremely talented players. Or even better, raise public academies in states to provide for these youngsters. But then again, the money will only be looted in the vicious cycle of corruption.
However, setting up a board to ensure the continuous quality of academies in Nigeria is a good goal. Therefore, if an individual cannot afford to train young boys, then they shouldn’t start the business in the first place.
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