Managing Nigerian Football Failures (NFF)

But we love our football and once again the “not so super” Eagles have disappointed their legion of fans, ending their African Nations Cup 2015 campaign by failing to qualify for the finals. Nigerian football is a miniature version of Nigerian society, and the reasons for our footballing failures are the same as for our […]

But we love our football and once again the “not so super” Eagles have disappointed their legion of fans, ending their African Nations Cup 2015 campaign by failing to qualify for the finals. Nigerian football is a miniature version of Nigerian society, and the reasons for our footballing failures are the same as for our general national socio-economic malaise. Incompetent leadership, inefficient administration, inappropriate strategy, corrupt practices, indiscipline, and absence of a well-articulated generally accepted plan are the hallmarks of maladministration in Nigerian.
Our inability to qualify for the upcoming Nations Cup is just another watershed in the spiralling fortunes of the once “super” Eagles. Despite having the requisite raw materials, talents, desire, and passion, both our footballing fortunes and national socio-economic fortunes are on the downslide. Having formerly achieved the highest ever ranking of an African nation by FIFA, from the glorious heights of 5th in the world our national team is now ranked 42nd. It’s quite evident that all the intrigue in the Nigerian Football Federation (NFF), the dubious elections, threats of FIFA sanctions, financial scandals, and re-instating the sacked coach, had less to do with making the team successful and more to do with who controls the billions that go unaccounted for every year in the name of Nigerian football. Nowadays international sporting occasions have taken on a larger than life dimension. Events such as the Olympic Games, the World Cups in Football, Cricket, and Rugby, and various regional competitions are not simply confined to sports lovers but attract worldwide audiences. They have become about showcasing national achievement through sporting excellence and showing the world that a country is can excel and is organized in at least one area.
The importance of sporting success to a nation can’t be overemphasized and the current shambles our national football team is ill-befitting of the “giant of Africa”. The way to achieve success is through hard work, excellence, planning, and sacrifice. Once these ingredients are missing, failure is sure to follow. These in a nutshell are the missing ingredients in our so far fruitless search for success as a nation. Our football players routinely pray on the pitch before football matches without actually preparing adequately for success. Its little wonder they fail to win and end up drawing the game or being beaten by supposedly inferior opposition. As a nation we habitually pray and continue to hope that somehow by “God’s grace” we shall succeed even when we know we haven’t made any serious plans or adequate preparations.
The apparent inability of today’s leaders to articulate plans and see them through successfully is our greatest failure, and it appears as if our fortunes aren’t about to change. Regrettably there is no long term plan in place to ensure that even twenty years from now we shall have a league which provides employment on a large scale such as the English Premier League (EPL), and produces a steady stream of international standard players. World champions simply cannot be produced from the poor standard of our league; our training facilities; or our pitches.
Coaching techniques and facilities in Nigeria are way below international standards. At an Africa Sport in Diaspora meeting held in London aimed at convincing sportsmen of African descent to ditch foreign countries and represent their country of origin, Nigerian born sportsmen made it clear that their country had nothing to offer in terms of fulfilling their potential. Unfortunately there is no end to failure in sight because the Ministry of Sports and Ministry of Education see no correlation between our increasingly poor performances and the fact that school sports have become a thing of the past. The unimportance of sports in our national developmental strategies is glaring as these days Government approves and licenses schools which have no sports facilities whatsoever. The de-emphasis of participatory sporting activities in schools has got to the stage that physical education is now taught in classrooms and examined by writing!  There is no encouragement for talented youngsters to consider a career in professional sports in Nigeria. As far as the national football team is concerned ordinary Nigerian football fans tend to agree on two observations.
Firstly, assembling aged players who play for different club sides in different countries, and attempting to blend them into a successful team isn’t the correct strategy. Successful international teams draw the bulk of their players from two or three clubs in their home leagues sprinkled with the best overseas players. Secondly there is an urgent need to expose our local players to the advanced coaching systems, TV playbacks, good diet, recreational facilities, physiotherapy and medical facilities which are the norm overseas. If we want regular success then Government must implement a long term plan to fully privatize our league to take advantage of the massive employment potentials. Those administrators who have consistently presided over failure must be replaced, and the structure of football administration overhauled. Government must not allow the one area in which the nation has a right to expect a modicum of success to become victim of their inadequacies.  As the saying goes those who fail to plan, plan to fail.