Nigerian Players And Lack Of Lucrative Offers

Since the summer transfer window opened on 1 July, top European clubs have been signing players with mouth watering offers, while those yet  to be signed are being tempted with lucrative deals. But no Nigerian player is among the stars attracting these irresistible offers.

The reasons for the sad fate of Nigerian players in the transfer market are not farfetched. Stakeholders argue strongly that Nigerian professional footballers will continue to attract peanuts or none at all until the system that produces the players at home is fully sanitised.

It is believed that players from Nigeria, being the reigning African champions, would have ordinarily attracted the attention of players’ agents  from Europe, but the reverse is the case as none of them has been approached in the transfer market, which enters Day 37 today.

A FIFA licensed football agent, Princely Nwafor, argues that the reason Nigerian footballers are no longer the toasts of agents could be attributed to the poor state of the Nigeria Professional Football League, NPFL. We agree with Nwafor that the way the league is run does not allow the system to produce quality players that can attract mouth watering contracts.

One of the banes of the league is the poor transfer policy. This led to the disqualification of Rangers International of Enugu from the ongoing CAF Cup by the Confederations of African Football. Rangers were disqualified from the cup on technical grounds for featuring Emmanuel Daniel against CS Sfaxien of Tunisia.

According to CAF, the former Flying Eagles’ goalkeeper was not eligible at that stage to feature in the competition. The disqualification of Rangers is a clarion call to relevant authorities to ensure that players’ transfers are properly documented to prevent the Daniel saga from repeating itself.

Football clubs in Europe are now aware of the shameless falsification of age by Nigerian players. This has led most of the Nigerian footballers to move to obscure leagues in Asia, where they earn peanuts and play in bad weather and are given poor medical package.

Gone are the days when Nigerian footballers were the toast of top European clubs. The majority of the Super Eagles players now settle for less because they are aware of the fact that most football agents know that they falsify their ages before arriving Europe.

Except for few players such as Spartak Moscow’s Emmanuel Emenike, Villarreal’s Ikechukwu Uche and Chelsea midfielder, Mikel Obi, most of the Nigerian players are not attracting buyers.

The proliferation of second-rate football academies must also be nipped in the bud, while the NFF and the National Sports Commission, NSC , must also have a complete database of Nigerian players. A number of academies across the country admit footballers above the age of 18 years and will in turn recommend these players to the Golden Eaglets coaches as U-17 players. Last week the Local Organising Committee, LOC, of MTN Lagos Street Soccer Championship, a grassroots football tourney, disqualified at least 50 players who falsified their ages during the screening for the U-15 category of the tournament.

In a country where things work, academy players are drawn from primary and secondary schools and a proper database of the players are kept. Having a complete database would prevent the falsification of ages, which has been a major bane of Nigerian players seeking greener pastures in the lucrative European leagues.