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The Nigerian Game

Football, football it seems that almost everybody loves football, well in Nigeria at least. We do not take it to the extreme as in the UK, where it seems to have replaced the main religion. Instead of people going to churches on Sunday, they go to the stadiums. The population attending church has decreased while the stadium attendance has increased over the years on a Sunday.

Empty Churches
Empty Churches


The number of church pews were becoming empty while the seats in the stadium were become filled. While the churches (non-pentecostal) are filled with a mainly female audience, with the average age being the late 60s. The stadiums have a mainly male attendance who are young and active who proudly wear their clubs colours. They fight, sing, shout for their clubs and some in a few instances kill.

Filled Stadium
Filled Stadium


As in everything else, there are those who take it to an extreme i.e. marry in the soccer stadium. They name their babies after key players and famous coaches. All the enthusiasm does not seem to rub off on me, I did not like football. Meanwhile my wife loves football and supports Arsenal. My father supported West Ham United in the early 70s while he said I supported Chelsea. I remember always reading during a main football match at the university because it was always quite. But since then, I have become very interested in watching Nigeria play. I went to see Nigeria play Japan once. I was in the Stadium and I notice that I became emotional and felt bad and troubled that these huge Nigerians were being beaten by short Japanese men.
We were all troubled the way that Nigerian came to World Cup. In the 3rd round of the Confederation of African Football (CAF) 2010 which acted as qualification of both the African Cup of Nations and the World Cup. While the other qualifiers won majority of the games played, Nigeria out of the 6 games played won 3, equalised 3 and Lost None. Nigeria just managed to beat Tunisia, only because Tunisia lost one game (to Mozambique 1-0). In the African Cup of Nations Nigeria came 3rd. After beating Zambia on penalties in the Quarter-finals, Nigeria was beaten by Ghana in the semi-finals. Of course, the Nigerian coach Shaibu Amodu was sacked and replaced by former Sweden coach Lars Lagerback. Six countries are representing Africa they are Algeria, Cameroon, Côte d'Ivoire, Ghana, and South Africa. They have a FIFA ranking of Algeria(30), Cameroon(19), Côte d'Ivoire(27), Ghana(32) and South Africa (83).


The Kick
The Kick
Based on the FIFA rankings the last games played turn out as expected. But we Nigerians have a habit of surprising people. Greece(13) and Argentina(7) were supposed to beat us. But if you analyse these games it looks at if we should have won the games against Argentina and Greece. The game against Argentina we had a very strong goal keeper and we missed some serious opportunities. It was as if our strikers could not find the back of the net. Meanwhile the goal the Argentina team scored was as a result of a "defensive error" according to Lars Lagerback, as it seems to be off side. But the defeat by Greece can be said to be unforgiveable as we were very strong at the start we scored the first goal. Then a international player Sani Haruna Kaita for Alania Vladikavkaz on loan from AS Monaco FC. Did a stupid thing he kicked Vasilis Torosidis over what seem to be a disagreement about a throw-in. He was given a red card immediately and hence weaken the team. It was down hill from there on, like what happen to England's David Beckham during the Argentina match in 1998 where he was given a red card. One time Beckham was the most hated player in England and look at Beckham now. Beckham is now UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador and in a fairly good position maybe there is still hope for Sani. Nigerians are not football crazy like some Columbians who had Andrés Escobar Saldarriaga killed over the own goal in 1994. It is said that the person who shot him shouted "GOAL!" as he pressed the trigger.



It seems Nigeria is on it's way out, but from pass experience we should not underestimate Nigeria.Some of the losts can be logically explained on FIFA's ranking (although by looking at the games we had the advantage). But our next match against South Korea (47) we are suppose to win it. Since South Korea had already beaten Greece and the South Koreans might be over confidence in under estimating Nigerians. Hence there is still hope for Nigeria we are not out yet, we are like a wounded animal and these are the most dangerous. England(8) is also in a similar position equalised with USA(14) and with Algeria(30) and now in the lower 2 of the group.

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