The football loss shouldn't provoke the ugly comments and resentments that it has so far done. While the situation is grave and awful, the comments, emotions and opinions I have read, in my view, have largely been misdirected. This is a National loss that should be seen as being beyond football; male or female, age-grade or full international,
I expect boys and girls to sit down, dig deep, look inwards and find out that something is lost in the fabric of Nigeria. Those things are SUCCESS and PROGRESS. Nothing is working in Nigeria. Nothing! We have continued to fail in football-male & Female, except for a break-in-transmission to welcome Umaru& Goodluck with the S/Korea '07 with Yemi Tella. We've been failing every time and everywhere. Sports which used to be the binding factor and rallying point of the National Front has become an anathema to the citizenry. It isn’t time to lament. It is time to become introspective and fix our country. Surface dressing has and would always fail. We just failed woefully at the World Athletics meet, the All African games 2 years ago too was a disaster. The MRI age-thing is going to see us collapse in the Nigeria U-17 W/cup definitely,
Everybody is crying “Bring on Siasia!,” but you all appear to forget that as ‘successful’ as the gaffer might seem, no one prepares to come second. There are no prizes for second place. It’s a winner-takes-all world. Siasia has never won any tournament, you would also call for his sack,
No! The job we have is to tackle our hydra-headed monster of corruption and fix our country. Let us have light (power) and good transportation, I’ve not said ROADS. Roads are not the only means of transporting goods and services, Give us employment and Housing. With roads, employment and housing, we would get food and clothing for ourselves. With constant power supply, inflation would fall by 50%.
Finally and most importantly, give us Education. It’s so ugly, our ivory towers at the moment, as usual, are on strike! Yet, we are lamenting football entertainment, When all of these are fixed, football and sports would be devoid of corruption and desperation. Only the best athletes and boys would volunteer for sports. Sports would no longer be an easy avenue to make money from the government.
Take the cue from USA. They fixed everything before considering football in 1970. Today, they are in the top 20 countries in the world, the world beaters in female football and the No 1 country in the Olympics. That’s what we are talking about. Nothing can succeed on an irresponsible base.
It’s time to fix Nigeria, to look beyond the superficial. It’s time to act! The time might not be exactly now but the TIME SPAN is definitely between NOW and May 29, 2011! Let us leave Amodu and the boys alone. This goes beyond eleven players on a pitch. I submit.