Nigeria and cheating at age-grade competitions
I write today after being on AWOL (away without leave) for about a fortnight. Apologies to my readers. I was indisposed. This week I am writing on a very sensitive subject, one which Nigeria has been guilty of for many decades. That is the issue of cheating with respect to age-grade competitions like the Under-17, Under-20 and Under-23.
On a recurring basis, we prosecute these championships with over-age players with the ‘win-at-all-cost’ mentality forgetting that these tourneys are mere developmental and are intended to unearth future stars. Nigeria fields players who have played in the local league for years and parade them as U-17 and does the same for the U-20-23, with players who were involved in the same championships and are not eligible for the next competition paraded again. All the officials do is procure new passports for the players but forget FIFA has the records.
When we win, we celebrate forgetting we are merely celebrating mediocrity as these players never get to play for the senior national team as they were well beyond their years from the outset. Today the likes of Iker Casillas of Spain and Real Madrid, Messi of Argentina and Barcelona, to mention a few, are leading lights for club and country almost a decade after taking part in youth tourneys. Where are ours? They have been cut out and are off the football radar and gone into extinction, save for a few exceptions like Mikel Obi.
Our win-at-all-cost mentality is killing our football as genuine promoters of the game with soccer academies from where young talents can be got and nurtured for these tourneys are neglected for older players who eventually help sometimes to win the competitions but fade out after a couple of years as they had reached their peak with the youth teams and cannot give more when invited to the senior national teams, if they ever make it there.
One is alarmed that a player who says he is 17 is already a father of 2-3 kids (though biologically possible) when he should be a budding youth and fresh from secondary school, but we do not really care and the NFF is culpable here. YSFON, Academicals and soccer academies who should provide the raw materials for these tourneys are not given the chance due to the shortsightedness of our administrators who believe only in the now and not in the future. Have you ever wondered that while in the developing world we screen these games on primetime and pay massively for TV rights, the likes of England, France and other developed countries merely report the results and show clips of the games. This is because they see it as developmental and an avenue to groom future stars from the production mill.
Our mentality towards age-grade competitions must change if we want to develop our football. Our football eggheads must rely on the soccer academies that abound in the country and shun players who have been playing in the league for upwards of 5-6 years. Our football will only retrogress and we will never get any joy year in, year out, from the competitions we participate in. We should learn from our past mistakes by looking at the statistics of how many players have gone through the mill and excelled after these respective age group tournaments. They are very few and far between.
It is important to catch them young and nurture them. A word is enough for the wise. It is important to note that ‘for our tomorrow we must give our today’. Hope the authorities are listening.
Ade Adefeko