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Before We Fail Again By Segun Obasa Nigerian football vis-à-vis her qualification for the World Cup finals have been bedevilled by maladministration, corruption, government interference , ethnicity, among other knotty problems. Our first serious attempt at qualifying for the world Cup finals in 1974 was stillborn as our match with Ghana was disrupted by Lagos fans, who were angry at the officiating of the match. In 1977, before the all-important World Cup qualifier against Tunisia in Lagos, the NFA hiked the gate fees. This led the home fans to jeer at the Eagles .And when the much- expected goal did not come early enough, our players became nervous and started putting every foot wrong. This eventually led to Godwin Odiye, who up until that day, was imperious in our defence, scoring an own goal through an art he had perfected for club and country- a header of a back pass. It is important to note that a year or two before this match, some outstanding players in the national team had complained or stayed away for what they perceived as favouritism on the part of the coaches. Notable among them were Ernest Ufele, Kennneth Ilodigwe and Baba Otu Mohammed. Mistrust and envy predicated on ethnic sentiments reigned supreme in the national camp. The football authorities swept this reality under the carpet, as if it were non-existent. This singular inaction, coupled with Usiyen’s departure for the United States and of course , the conspiracy between Tunisia (the eventual qualifiers from Africa) and Egypt cost us the ticket for Argentina ’78. In 1981, the last hurdle we needed to cross to Espana ’82 was Algeria. A country we had beaten comprehensively the previous year in the final of the Nations’ Cup in Lagos. Sunday Dankaro, the pragmatic FA chairman was inexplicably removed by the powers that be, and replaced with Mike Okwechime. The aftermath of this asinine decision was the forcing of certain players on Otto Gloria, the Green Eagles handler for political reasons. Chief among whom was Christian Chukwu , the exemplary captain of the Green Eagles when they won the Nations’ Cup on home soil in 1980 and who retired immediately after the tournament from international football. Algeria did the unthinkable beating us 2-0 at the National Stadium. The rustiness of Chukwu was palpable. The two goals were caused by Chukwu’s inability to cope with the pace of Assad, Belloumi and Madjer. We were to lose the second leg 1-2 in Algeria. In 1984, Adeboye Onigbinde who, before he travelled to the Nations’ Cup finals in the Ivory Coast had no balls to train his players with and no team bus, took a bunch of young , hungry and determined players to the final of the tournament, losing to a more experienced Cameroun side, which had among their ranks players plying their trade in Europe, and the core of whom were at Espana ’82 two years earlier. Nigeria players whose talents were undisputable got to the final through grit and graft. When three of those players : Ademola Adeshina, Paul Okoku and Dahiru Sadi were invited for trials by Watford fc of England, they were arrested at the airport and driven to the National Stadium were they were told they have a more important assignment. This was during the Buhari/ Idiagbon regime . If they had been allowed to travel, I am sure they would have brought the experience they garnered therefrom to bear on our qualifiers for Mexico ’86. Onigbinde was shoved aside and in came Chris Udumezue (since deceased) and later Pat Ekeji. Inconsistent policy was our bane. We stood on thin ice when we played against Tunisia. We hoped against hope that we would qualify, but it was not to be as we were beaten by a better prepared Tunisia. After narrowly beating Angola on 12th August 1989, through a Stephen Keshi header in Lagos, and with the group decider against Cameroun around the corner, The NFA and the Williams-led NSC in their wisdom brought in Clemens Westerhoff as our Technical Adviser, Paul Hamilton was relegated to the background. Not only did westerhoff drop some experienced players on the eve of the match, the rest as they say, is history, as we failed yet again to qualify . At USA ’94 where we surpassed our own expectation by getting to the second round.The way the NFA handled the payment of bonuses was shambolic. The players and the NFA were continuously at daggers drawn over Match bonuses. Omeruah and the players’ representatives were always involved in negotiations into late nights. The players took advantage of this by breaking camp rules with impunity and when Westerhoff suggested they moved to another hotel because girls had easy passage to the players’ rooms, the NFA was found wanting in its cardinal responsibility. I have watched the Match with Italy over and over again; the Italians snatched victory from the jaws of defeat. It was not a match we should have lost. Out of the 23 players we took ton France ’98, nine of them had no business there. They either had pre-tournament injuries which the handlers were aware of, or were past their best years. Jonathan Akpoborie, arguably the best Nigerian striker on form at the commencement of the World Cup finals was left out of the team. Even the appointment of Bora Milutinovich was a mistake. He was alien to African football and its concomitant politics. A player who was on the bench at the tournament , expect for a brief appearance against Bulgaria, was said to have usurped the Technical Adviser’s responsibility of drawing the final list of players because of his closeness to the late Sani Abacha. In 2002, the three wise men who pulled Nigeria’s chestnuts out of the fire by qualifying us for the world cup against all odds, were sacked for daring to stand up for their rights. Not only that , two of our most experienced players were dropped for allegedly insulting the sports minister. Those two players played the game of their lives in Sudan in 2001, a game which to my mind gave us the glimmer of hope of qualifying for the mundial. Korea/ Japan remains our worst outing at the world cup finals. Up until the moment he was suspended( another way of saying sacked in local parlance), I asked myself continually what informed the choice of Chukwu as the national team coach by the achievement NFA. He did not record any remarkable feat at ASESA, Rangers. Lebanon and Kenya. His only achievement was being Westerhoff’s assistant. He was able to last that long with Westerhoff where Hamilton, Ganiyu Salami, Tunde Disu and Sebastian Brodericks had failed, not because of his tactical savvy as a coach , but because he needed little urging to be Westerhoff’s yes-man. Any body close to the Eagles camp in Westerhoff’s glory years will understand what I am talking about. The inclusion of certain players in the team by chukwu showed he considered other factors in his team selection other than fitness and ability. Our failure to qualify for the world cup in Germany next year should teach us some lessons. First, we should have people who understand the game at the helm of affairs in the soccer house. People who have the love and the interest of the interesting game at heart. Not people who hanker for NFA positions o feather heir own nest. Today, it churns my bile that Galadima is unapologetic for his role in our bungled world cup dream. But if the truth has to be told, can one really blame Galadima? He and other sports ministers that we had had since the inception of the present regime in 1999 were chosen singly on the basis of party affiliation. In continuation of our scratch-my-back-i-scratch-your-back culture . So, as the NFA elections draw nearer, let it be treated with all the seriousness it deserves. Our football house has to be restructured and let the government hands off football. Government intervention in our football has done more harm than good. Football is big business all over the world and Nigeria can plough enough money from football without government funding. We might flounder initially but I am sanguine we shall survive and shine again. Salvaging our football should be a collective responsibility. We have left it in the hands of buccaneers for far too long. Before we fail again, let’s all take active interest in who runs our football. As it stands, it’s all that we have got.
Segun Obasa writes from Austin, Texas
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