MOSCOW: There’s something about the African football teams. Hugely talented, but still remain success-starved at the sports biggest platform.
During an informal chat with Moustapha Hadji in Doha few years back, the Morocco legend and 1998 World Cup hero said that ‘it’s always difficult to handle a bundle of talents’.
Quite rightly so. When you’ve an entire team of excellent footballers, there’ll bound to have ego clashes in the locker room so much so that it becomes difficult for the coaches to handle each of them.
Nigeria’s Super Eagles has always been a fantastic squad since the days we’ve started watching Nwanku Kanu, Finidi George and others at the 1994 World Cup.
All five of Nigeria’s World Cup finals victories out of their 18 matches have been against European opposition.
The Super Eagles beat Bulgaria 3-0 and Greece 2-0 in 1994, Spain 3-2 and Bulgaria 1-0 in 1998, followed by Bosnia and Herzegovina 1-0 in 2014.
At this year’s edition, Nigeria has come with one of the youngest teams, with 18 players set to take part in a FIFA World Cup match for the first time.
Only skipper John Obi Mikel, Ahmed Musa, Victor Moses, Ogenyi Onazi and Kenneth Omeruo have previously played in the World Cup.
But one of the debutants, William Troost-Ekong, is relishing the chance for them to prove themselves on the world stage.
“Many of us will be playing at the World Cup for the first time, but this may work in our favour as we might surprise others. We will play without fear,” he said.
At the most, the Gernot Rohr-coached side will qualify to the next round, which they had in the last two editions. But Nigeria, like Senegal or Cameroon, have always failed to live up to our expectations.
The African players are the top exports to the world’s glamourous leagues. Even an average player earn good salary in the Middle-East, south-east and south Asian countries.
But their football setup is like any other third-world nations, where the growth is slow due to the faction rivalries, corruption and lack of professionalism. That may be some of the other reasons why they couldn’t become another Croatia or Iceland.
Africa is a relatively poor continent. There’s lack of facilities and kids do not get proper nutrition which can help in their development.
Moreover, they are not exposed to the High Performance Facilities though there are exceptions like Didier Drogba and Samuel Etoo but players like them are few in numbers who went to France early in their careers and made an impact.
In the end, all the good brains leave Africa due to wars, dictators and football is managed by people, who’re favoured by dictators and warlords. http://www.khelupdates.com
