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The recent dismal performances of our national football teams should worry those in charge of the nation’s football. Government must take quick measures to check the slide in the nation’s football as well as stem the rot in the nation’s football house. No doubt, football is globally acknowledged as the No.1 sport which nations use to measure their strengths. Good performance in the game can boost a nation’s image. Therefore, from whichever angle we view the recent performances of the national teams, the results have been dismal. The U-17 team, which holds the record for the most successful team in the age-grade competition, having won the trophy five times, failed this year to go past the second round having suffered 4-1 defeat by Netherlands. The U-23 male Olympic team could not get out of its group in the recent qualifiers played in Egypt. This is a competition in which the team emerged as African champions four years ago and went on to put up a credible performance at the global sporting fiesta by finishing third at the Rio Olympics in 2016.
Within the last few months, the Super Eagles team B, otherwise known as the Home Eagles, had failed to make the needed impact in this year’s WAFU Cup and crashed out in the preliminary round of the CHAN competition. What is amazingly common to all of these teams, apart from the U-17 team, is that they were all coached by one of the best home-grown coaches, Imama Amakapabor. Even the U-17 was coached by another celebrated local talent, Manu Garba who had won the U-17 World Cup four years before in 2015. Similarly, the Super Falcons had failed earlier to qualify for the Tokyo Olympics coming up next year, crashing on home soil to their Cote d’Ivoire opponents. The foreign coach of the female national team, Thomas Dennerby, boycotted the last Olympic qualifier on account of interference with team selection and other unprofessional treatments allegedly meted out to him by his minders.
It is the worst defeat the country could suffer in the game on the continent where we reigned supreme and also made good impressions on the global stage. Many keen observers of the game are worried over the dismal outings. This can explain why the Sports Minister, Sunday Dare, has asked the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) to furnish him with technical reports of all the national teams which have failed woefully in their recent outings.
The NFF has welcomed the minister’s intervention and has promised to do so after their annual general meeting in Benin-city, Edo State capital on November 28. But without preempting the outcome of the investigation there is no doubt that poor funding contributes to our dismal performance in sports generally. Football has become a huge global business and those who excel in it must invest so much in the game in order to achieve more results. Our usual fire brigade approach to matters of sports cannot take us anywhere. This is even more so when it comes to football. For our teams to excel in football and other sports, there is need for careful and well-focused planning, preparation and execution. The rather toxic atmosphere under which the present NFF board has operated has not helped matters, too. The struggle to become members of the NFF board amongst some stakeholders is seriously affecting the running of the NFF. The endless court cases and arbitrations that follow each election do not bode well for the agency. This development has been inimical to the growth of the game at home as well as our performance at the global level.
We do not know why talented coaches like Manu Garba, Imama Amakapabor and others should not be allowed to freely build their teams for both local and international competitions from local talents that abound in the country instead of going for foreign players who may not have enough time to blend with their team mates before any completion.
