Ken UGBECHIE

Let’s talk sport. Let’s talk football, the Beautiful Game-turned ugly in Nigeria. In recent years, football, the passion of the people, has become the pain of the people. The World Cup is barely a month away, Nigeria won’t be there.

The national team, the Super Eagles, was disgraced out of the last Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON). They have always been shamed out of the competition by smaller countries. The last time Nigeria won the nation’s cup was in 2013 under the watch of the nation’s greatest soccer legend – Stephen Keshi. He won it both as a player and as a coach. Incredible record!

On the continent, Nigerian club sides have become easy meat for clubs from other African nations especially north African teams. The local professional football league keeps dimming in glory. It has even disappeared from television. Whereas Ethiopia football league matches are aired on DSTV, the cable TV brand that enjoys the widest viewership in this part of the world, Nigeria professional football league matches suffer TV blackout. Sponsors complain they can’t put down their money because the managers have not exhibited enough transparency with managing funds.

But the nation’s football house has not always been squeaky clean even in the best of times. Just like the world football ruling house, FIFA, the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) reeks of corruption. Era after era, sordid tales of graft and fiscal miasma signpost the football house. Match officiating was always a scarlet script. Though, there appears to be some improvement now. Stadium management is a challenge. Player welfare is a fairy tale of shadows and mirages. Players are promised candies and cakes but served bitters and Bitrex.

Up till the early 90s, Nigeria football buffs still clutched to the weakened ligaments of loyalty to and followership of Nigerian club football. Not anymore! Loyalty has shifted to European football with English Premier League (EPL) as the nirvana, the Holy Grail of club football. Well organized and now attracting big money from all over the world, the EPL has eclipsed club football in Nigeria. Fans could barely reel out names of clubs and players. They can’t tell a match venue or name a coach in the manner they have mastered the dialectics of EPL.

As I write this, my friend and equally passionate football connoisseur, Kayode Oduntan, reminded me of the 2007/2008 English Premier League (EPL) which started with suspense and ended with equal measure of suspense and apprehension. It was a season too hard to call because the tense competition ensured that no clear winner could emerge until the last kick of the ball on the final day.

At the end, Manchester United, the Dreamers from Old Trafford got the only reward that could possibly have gone to any of the 20 teams. In some seasons, the winner was decided well ahead of the last two or so matches but not this time. The winner had to wait till the last kick of the ball. Though United won, it was never going to be their cup. The team tutored by Sir Alex Ferguson started shabbily, losing to traditional rivals, Manchester City and dropping early points in not-so-competitive grounds. That pushed them many rungs down the table. But fortune, they say, favours the brave. Sir Alex’s men had to brave the odds and finished strongest.

In reality, the Cup was to be Arsenal’s. As an unflappable fan of the Gunners, I had boasted early in the season that the only team fit for the cup was the team with the gun. And who would not fear a man with a gun. There were reasons to believe it was to be Arsenal’s year. They play supreme, sublime football, in fact the best football in the world. They alone can caress, tease and tickle the ball in the most romantic manner. They seduce the spectators with their brand of football, something I often call ‘computer-generated’ football.

The EPL has been so well packaged that it attracts the biggest followership on the face of the earth. In Nigeria, the passion is frenetic. In a crowd of ten Nigerians, including women, you are likely to find at least nine of them fans of different EPL clubs

And you wonder, why can’t we have such followership for Nigeria professional league. Why can’t we have die-hard fans of Enyimba FC or Nasarawa United? The reason is not because Nigerians are on a certain aphrodisiac that has made them forsake their own. It is because managers of Nigeria football have brought the once-upon-a-time booming industry to ruins. In those days in the old Bendel State, our love for Bendel Insurance of Benin, New Nigeria Bank FC and Flash Flamingos of Benin (aka Flaming Flamingos) was with much fervency. In the East, Rangers was a deity of some sort. Go North and Racca Rovers commanded a cult persona.

In the South West, you could hear from a distance, echoes of the schizophrenic support for Shooting Stars of Ibadan and Stationery Stores of Lagos. As someone growing up in the rural precincts of what is now Delta State, the Panasonic radio was our undying equivalent of today’s cable television. And Ernest Okoronkwo was to us what Peter Drury, Martin Tyler and our own Efan Ekokwu are to fans of Euro-soccer especially the EPL. Such was the passion for local football in those days to the extent that as we file out to play street football, you could hear chants of Odegbami, Chairman Christian Chukwu, Muda Lawal and Block Buster Aloy Atuegbu from the sidelines. These were the heroes of Nigeria football at that time and they instantly became our role models such that on-field, we assume their names. We bore other nicknames like Kenneth Abana, Yisa Sofoluwe (Dean of Defence), Adokie Amasiemeka, et al. The same cannot be said of players toiling in the same local league today. The Nigerian league is dead or at best crippled.

Globalisation? Yes and no. Yes, because globalisation ensured that I stayed glued to cable television at all times but we ought to take advantage of it the same way we did with Nollywood. Visit any part of Africa today and people are watching DSTV Africa Magic channels where Nigerian home video is king. In a sense, Nigeria has taken advantage of satellite TV to ‘colonise’ Africa using the medium of home video but she has woefully failed to do same with football because those who run our football are vision killers. The only trophy they see is the stolen cash in their pocket. Our football is in the grave and that’s why Arsenal, not Enyimba, would always be on my mind. And it doesn’t make me any less patriotic.

Ibrahim Musa Gusau, the new NFF President, has so much in his plate. Nigeria football sure needs an exorcist to deliver it from the legion of demons holding it down. Will it be Gusau? It’s his call to make. He now has the opportunity to write his name in gold or join the dunghill of locusts who came, saw and ruined Nigeria football. History beckons. Grab it, Mr. Gusau.