It has become a routine for self-styled age analysts to begin to raise issues any time Nigerian age grade Teams are making impact at the world stage. It is only when our Youth Teams are better prepared and more talented than their counterparts from other parts of the world that Nigerians who seemingly don’t like good things will begin to ask questions on the integrity of the ages and durability of the players. Usually, when we participate in such tournaments and fail, what usually follows is huge wave of criticisms on the players and coaching crew, and such critics will not usually remember to suggest how such players who could not deliver could be improved to deliver at other levels in future.
It is a shame that even professional sports analysts and media personalities still could not resist the temptation to disparage Nigerian Youth Teams over age issues even after FIFA, the world football governing body has introduced the MRI testing process to detect over-aged players. In 2009, our Team was beaten by the visibly bigger Swiss U - 17 Team to lift the Trophy right at our backyard here in Lagos, and nobody cried foul, even the Swede Team at the 2013 UAE U - 17 Tourney are imposing in stature compared to the very youthful and boyish looking Nigerian lads. I just wonder why we have to be so unnecessarily self-righteous and hypocritical. If you don’t have proof that someone was born in a particular year, and the process established to confirm the passport age did not throw up any issue, please why not appreciate the fact that someone has done a good job in assembling a Team of young lads from Nigeria who are taking the world by storm.
The next concern of most critics has to do with if these great players of this stage will become truly great in future, if they will ever match Ronaldo or Messi. Some has gone ahead to ask for the whereabouts of players like Macaulay Chrisanthus of the Korea 2007 fame and Sani Emmanuel of the Nigeria 2009, as if it is so hard to run a simple internet query to find out where these players are. Some even will go to the extent of comparing John Mikel Obi’s progress with Lionel Messi who were silver and golden ball winners respectively at the 2005 U - 21 World Cup. Frankly, these are all lame and ignorant and baseless queries. Why compare Macaulay with Toni Kroos, what about his own Team mates like the bulky Richard Sukuta-Pasu who tormented the other U-17s as a striker but is nowhere near the German national Team at the moment?
First of all, in
life, it is not every member of a particular class that will go on to become
Doctors, Lawyers, Civil Servants and the rest at the same time. People will
always take different paths with diverse outcomes and implications for their
future. It is not only in Nigeria that you find players from a particular Team
fizzling out after the tournament. People are always quick to mention Luis Figo
of Scotland ’89 U – 17 World Cup, it is true he played for long, but it is also
true that some members of the Nigerian Team at the same tournament like Victor
Ikpeba, Godwin Okpara and Benedict Akwuegbu also went far in their careers
while most of Figo’s Portuguese ’89 Team
mates also fizzled out.
I can’t remember how many Brazilian players of the Nigeria ’99
fame made as much impact as Ronaldinho and probably Julio Cesar. The Argentine
Team at Holland 2005 gave the world Lionel Messi, but which of his other team mates have
achieved Messi’s type of career feats? In every case, you have players who will
stand out internationally, and some who will retire to local reckoning and some
who will remain average achievers, this is true for both Nigeria and every
other country, that is why the likes of Joseph Yobo and Rabiu Afolabi of
Nigeria ‘99 are still active and John Obi Mikel, Onyekachi Apam, Chinedu Ogbuke
and the rest of the 2005 Flying Eagles Squad are still doing their bit all over
the world.
The point here is
that, age grade competition is more of a platform for budding talents but not
every single member of a Team will become superstars in every sense of the
word, it is just not possible.
It is even unfair to
compare the progress of an African player struggling to make it in Europe with
an indigenous European born or bred kid without considering the constraints and
challenges. Toni Kroos will always do better than Chrisanthus because he is
German and playing in the German League. Don’t forget the rules on the number of non-EU
players that can feature for a European side. Do you think this is not a
limiting factor on the careers of most African players? Chrisanthus was in
Germany for awhile and has moved to the Spanish lower rung league. Sani
Emmanuel struggled to find a place at Lazio, where his Team Mate, Onazi Ogenyi has established himself, and he has consequently
moved to the Swiss League to explore his opportunities further. Even European players as well as their South
American counter-parts go through spells at the lower rungs or less fancied
Teams. I remember Ronaldo made his European debut through the Dutch side PSV
Eindhoven even after lifting the 1994 World Cup with Brazil, the very lethal
Carlos Tevez played for West Ham United, so please, our former youth players
are not lost, you can find them if you want and they still have a chance to
make it big. If you check well on the internet, you will see the history of
every player, and you will know that some of our former youth team players have
indeed been active in different parts of the world. If you are concerned that
they are not in the big Teams, ask yourself, are all ex-youth internationals
from Spain playing for FC Barcelona or Real Madrid, were they all called up to
the Senior Team?
The Senior National Team cannot contain everybody at the
same time, even Bojan of the 2007 Spanish U - 17 Team is yet to make it in the
national team, but our own Lukman Haruna from the same tournament has one World
Cup appearance under his belt while Ogenyi Onazi and Kenneth Omeruo of the 2009
edition have won the African Nations Cup already and heading to Brazil 2014. Kanu
Nwankwo, Wilson Oruma, Celestine Babayaro and Mobi Oparaku were instant hits
with the senior Teams after Japan ’93 U – 17 World Cup and Kanu has gone on to
become a legend that represents football globally. Meanwhile, no one from the Argentine Team at
the 1993 fiesta got any form of international fame, but the Italians who
finished bottom of their group managed to give us Gianluigi Buffon and Francesco
Totti. Nduka Ugbade, first black man to lift a FIFA World Cup at the China ’85 U
- 17 Tournament represented Nigeria into the ‘90s and he alongside Manu Garba
and another ex - Youth International Emmanuel Amuneke are tutoring this current
world beating Golden Eaglets side.
So how can you prove that Nigeria players do not progress
after age grade tournaments or how can you validly assert that it is only
Nigerian players that fail to advance after the age grade tourneys?
I wonder why nobody ever asked about the Egyptians, Tunisians
and Algerian players who also attend these tournaments - they all become stars
in their local leagues. This is now the
heart of the issue. The major reason why pundits will believe our players don’t
make impact after these youth tournaments is that the bulk of them will not
make it to Europe after the tournaments, and we rate success only by what a
player achieves in Europe, sadly though. It is unfortunate that we do not watch
the local league, otherwise, you will notice that we have so many ex - youth
internationals providing quality services in the local league. But
unfortunately, since the local league is unappreciated, poorly covered and
draws no special attention, these players too struggle through their careers in
oblivion, and therefore easily get maligned by pundits as age cheats who failed
to achieve their potentials. This is very unfair.
I would have loved to say that we should create a platform
to transition our youth players to European Leagues to ensure they remain
visible and relevant, but apart from the fact that this is not a very patriotic recommendation, the
restrictions and the market driven nature of the Leagues abroad will not allow
such wholesale trafficking of young players. So the only option left is for us as a nation is to invest seriously in sport academies, improve the quality and coverage as well as followership of the local leagues and ensure all first tier League Teams have Youth/Feeders Team structure for continuous transition. We should also find means to create more sport facilities at Local Government levels to ensure kids at the grassroots level develop their sports instincts earlier on in their lives. By doing all these, we will be able to develop and groom young talents on an ongoing basis and Nigeria will be able to impress the world every time.
As we celebrate the achievements of the UAE 2013 Golden Eaglets, we should be hopeful that with little efforts from all stakeholders, Kelechi Iheanacho, who has been rated by fifa.com as one of the best player of all times at the U - 17 level and his other extremely talented colleagues like Musa Yahaya, Abdullahi Alfa, Isaac Success, Taiwo Awoniyi and others will be around for a long time to come and Nigeria football will be better for it.
