Nigerian sports administrators are experts in quick fixes rather than carving out deliberate and enduring structures that would churn out talents seamlessly. I watched the new African Cup of Nations champions, the Teranga Lions of Senegal’s matches and each time tears flowed down my cheeks. I had heavy loaded heart each time commentators reminded us during their games of the advantages they have secured for the future, particularly their ages.
May I humbly ask our administrators: ‘how old will these players be by 2030? Besides, there is the deafening noise from a few football lovers trying to sway others to regulate their tunnel vision of making sure that second rated Coach Eric Chelle remains on the coaching bench. If I know our administrators very well, the selection of new players into Super Eagles would be farfetched. If we retain Chelle because of his pyrrhic victories in Morocco, no disrespect to what he has done (somebody needs to tell me),then we would have tacitly embraced cabals which would support the coach’s retention of certain players always playing our matches, except they are walking with walking sticks.
A Pyrrhic victory is a win achieved at such a devastating cost that it feels like a loss, with the victor suffering immense casualties, resources, or damage; making the success ultimately hollow or unsustainable, like winning a battle but losing the war. The term comes from King Pyrrhus of Epirus, who famously said after defeating Romans at great expense, “One more victory over the Romans and we are completely done for!”.
Indeed, the reason our soccer slid into the abyss was because many of us didn’t encourage new entrants into the Super Eagles after what our debutants at the USA ’94 World Cup in 1996 did withtheir what has now turned out to be pyrrhic victories. It got so bad that a sitting sports minister argued that he didn’t want that feat eclipsed by defeats from any country under the guise of playing friendly matches. The boys got so unruly that they plotted the sack of PhillipeTroussier, whose 3-5-2 formation had effectively removed the aging ones. It struck them so badly that it didn’t matter what Nigeria did at the France ’98 World Cup. Playing at the Mundial then was a birthright.
Our administrators have unwittingly conceded their rights to guard certain tenets of NFF/Chelle contract as it affects Chelle telling the world that his contract isn’t in his hands, when he has a subsisting contract with Nigeria. What happened to the famous right of not divulging anything enshrined in the contract? Isn’t this a breach? What has happened to the infamous oath of secrecy which all the parties in the contract must uphold?
“The coach was very emotional when he addressed the team after the quarter-final win over Algeria. He didn’t cry, but he was deeply moved. He told us that he has yet to be contacted by the NFF and so anything is possible as regards his future,” the team member told only SCORENigeria.
“Really he enjoys the support of the team and has made us one big, happy family. But we also know that several other countries are interested in working with him, with some of them offering him much more money than what he gets in Nigeria.”
Isn’t this a time bomb waiting to explode in the coming years of Chelle’s tenure? Haven’t we tacitly emboldened the players to pick the coach they want to work with when the chips are down, going forward? These are players with the penchant for civil disobedience when fighting for their entitlement.
Chelle has joined the league of journeymen that Nigeria has recruited who use our players’ innate skills during matches to enrich their Curriculum Vitae (CV) for future jobs across the globe.
Former Super Eagles coach and captain, Sunday Olisehwas dumfounded with the ceremony after Nigeria clinched another bronze medal at the AFCON, our ninth in the competition’s history and rightly so. The flipside to Oliseh’s argument is that some of the players are debutant and would surely want to celebrate their first senior medal at AFCON.
Oliseh submitted further that: “There was a time when the Super Eagles shed tears after finishing second, because to us, anything but the trophy was unacceptable.”
“Celebrating third place builds a culture of mediocrity.”
“I will give you an example of what I meant. Before the final in Rabat, a video went viral of the Super Eaglescelebrating winning third place against Egypt. At the media tribune where I sat, both African and European journalists mocked us; they couldn’t believe it,” Oliseh said.
“We must remember that the decline of our dominance started when we became content with bronze. If we want to be Africa’s best again, wild celebrations for anything less than gold must stop immediately,” Oliseh concluded.
Oliseh just reminded the younger generation of the Super Eagles that winning a third place isn’t worth it, not with the armada of stars we parade from across the globe. We have the players to win AFCON thrice on the trot, but a better coach who won’t look for amicable resolutions for high acts of indiscipline because it involves one of the big boys.
What Chelle succeeded in reawakening in the Super Eagles was drill them to required playing weights.But they lacked tactics to dislodge below the line marking, as seen in the games against Morocco and Egypt, which dragged beyond the stipulated 90 minutes duration.
Unfortunately, our football doesn’t have articulated nurseries whose curriculum comes from the football federation for the good of the game. The situation is so bad that the last expedition to Morocco by the Super Eagles was prosecuted by our Diaspora players who couldn’t sing our national anthem before the matches began. This writer cringed with envy listening to different commentators in the media reiterate the ages of the Senegalese players and how bright their future would be. Left in the lurch is the domestic game still pampers and unable to grow.
Interestingly, civilised countries develop their sports through the neighbourhood system, where facilities are built to engage the youth and push them away from social vices. Nurseries serve as the bases for storing the data of those discovered. Such information helps to nurture and monitor the good ones to stardom. Besides, nurseries lay the foundation on which the athletes are taught the rudiments of the game. It is at such factories that playing styles and patterns unique to such countries are evolving.
The countries that excel in sporting events have systems that guarantee enough funds for the sportsmen and sportswomen to compete with the best, such as tax rebates on sport-friendly firms, lotteries, and businesses owned by wealthy nationals who know what is in such a sponsorship and the benefits from the sitting government. Such financial taxes are spelled out to companies and wealthy citizens after agreements have been reached. These cast-in-stone policies are binding on all the parties to such an extent that breaches are adequately addressed to allow either of the parties to seek redress in court.
”Nigeria’s failure to qualify for the 2026 FIFA World Cup has carried a high financial cost, with the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) missing out on a guaranteed minimum of USD 10.5 million following FIFA’s approval of a record USD 655 million prize money pool for the tournament. FIFA confirmed that every one of the 48 teams that qualified for the expanded World Cup in North America will receive USD 1.5 million in preparation funds, in addition to a minimum participation payout of USD 9 million for teams finishing between 33rd and 48th place.
This ensures that each participating Member Association earns at least USD 10.5 million simply for qualifying.
Nigeria’s absence from the tournament means the NFF will receive none of these funds, a significant blow at a time when many African federations rely heavily on FIFA competitions to support national team programmes, grassroots development and administrative costs.’’
