Initially touted as a cancerous infection that has eating deep into the fabrics of Nigerian football, it was surprising as
Nigerians were jolted with a reported case of age cheat currently rocking the Athletics Federation of Nigeria (AFN).
The menace surfaced in the nation’s track & field recently when the Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU) queried the AFN to explain how four athletes had different ages in their documents with the world body.
The four junior athletes (name withheld) are due to compete for Nigeria at the World Under-20 Championship in Lima, Peru in August.
In a letter sighted by the media, including SUNDAY INDEPENDENT, which was addressed to the leadership of the AFN and signed by Head of the Athletics Integrity Unit, Brett Clothier, the AIU said it has “identified discrepancies regarding the date of birth for at least 4 Nigerian athletes,” noting “each of these athletes has at least two and sometimes three or more, different DOBs which have been used to enter competitions at different times.”
The letter dated June 7, 2024 and addressed to Tonobok Okowa and Rita Moshindi, President and Secretary General, respectively, of the AFN, gave the Nigerian track & field body timeline to respond to the query.
Amongst documents demanded from the AFN are the four athletes’ current passport, all previous passports, birth certificate, national ID card, documents submitted in support of passport applications, medical records, including hospitalisation records, dental records, vaccination records as well as edu- cation records, including matriculation records, school end-of-term/ year reports ad school examination results among others.
According to a source from the Ministry of Sports Development who spoke to SUNDAY INDEPENDENT, nothing short of falsification of ages could have led to what he called a show of shame caused by the athletics body.
“It’s obvious that in their usual manner, they want to favour some athletes and change their birth dates.
“This is a case of forgery of birth certificates and there is nothing to add or remove from this fact,” the source hinted.
Meanwhile, this latest develop- ment might actually take Nigerians to what has become a norm in the age group national teams. It is a sad reminder of the issue that has plagued Nigerian football in particular and sports in general. It is a reminder of what has plagued the progression in the Nigerian national team, leading to abysmal integration despite Nigeria’s dominance at the U17 national team level.
For instance, serial FIFA U17 world champions, the Golden
Eaglets of Nigeria, have been a victim of age cheats. Recall that the world’s most successful U17 national team had an unprecedented campaign in the 2013 edition in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and 2015 edition hosted by Chile.
After emerging winners in the two editions which brought the country’s record of winnings to five, an unprecedented achieve- ment, the Golden Eaglets failed to qualify for the 2017 edition in India. The non-qualification of the then defending champions was not because the cadet national team lacked the firepower to navigate through the qualifiers. The inability to qualify for that edition stemmed from what has continued to be the clog in national team development in the country.
Most of the players that won the 2015 edition in Chile formed the bulk of the team preparatory for the 2017 edition in India, with their manager, Manu Garba, banking so much on his players to qualify; but after 26 of their top junior players reportedly failed an age test, it was certain that the country was bound to be absent in a competition they had dominated.
With just two players from the 2015 U17 World Cup-winning team available, Golden Eaglets were badly depleted against Niger Republic and they subsequently lost and failed to qualify for that 2017 edition. Thus the emergence of avenues to ascertain the ages of the players proved right as the Golden Eagles suffered depletion
and failed to mount a challenge to qualify for that 2017 edition.
With Nigeria’s dominance in the U17 World Cup without commensurate reflection in, at least, U20 World Cup, analysts have pointed to wrong age declaration as the possible reason, positing that before the players would have been primed for honours at the subsequent editions, they are already past their primes.
When the Golden Eaglets defied all odds to emerge winners of the maiden edition of the FIFA U-16 tournament (later christened FIFA U17 World Cup) in 1985 in China, it marked the first time a country from Africa would be lifting a FIFA trophy.
After the tournament, late Brazilian legend, Pele, predicted that before the turn of the 19th century, an African country could win the FIFA World Cup. Pele, it will be recalled, premised his prediction on the talent he saw on display as Nigeria overcame all comers, including West Germany in the final, to lift the Kodak U16 tourney with stars such as Nduka Ugbade, Fatai Atere, Chukwuka Nwoha, Victor Igbinobare and Jonathan Akpob- orie, among others, announcing Nigeria to the whole world as youths.
But 39 years down the line, Africa only reached the semifinal of the FIFA World Cup at the last edition of the tournament in Qatar for the first time and Nigeria, whose performance made the Brazilian legend to so predict, was yet to cross the round of 16 of the World Cup.
Only four countries – Cameroon in 1990 in Italy, Senegal in 2002 in Korea/Japan, Ghana in South Af- rica in 2010 and Morocco in 2022 – have been able to get to the quarterfinal of the World Cup, with the North Africans hitting the semis, while the most successful country at the cadet level was yet to get past the round of 16.
While few stars from Nigerian went through U17 stage to announce themselves, suffice to say that globally, such talents as Argentina legend, Diego Armando Maradona, and his countryman, Lionel Messi, Oleg Salenko, Luis Figo, Emil Kostadinov, Proscineski, Boban, Rui Costa and Marco Van Basten, among others, were spotted at the age grade competitions, even as some, if not all of them, did not win anything at those developmental levels because their countries aligned their ambition with FIFA to discover future talents and not to win at all cost as Nigerian managers
For example, Andre Iniesta, Fernando Torres, Xavi, Ike Casilas, all Spanish nationals were all products of underage championship who later won the World Cup in 2010 in South Africa.
Some of these big stars of yesteryears came through age group competitions and, incidentally, so many of them did not win titles at that level because their country was focused on discovering new talents.
Thus, for a country intent on advancing its football and footballers, the intention is not necessarily to win at that level but to throw up stars that would conquer the world tomorrow.
But for Nigeria, the most successful country at the FIFA U17 World Cup with five triumphs achieved since that maiden victory in 1985, it has not leveraged the successes of the cadet level to achieve big things at the senior level as allegations of overage players being used to prosecute games at this foundation stages have continued to rock the country with verifiable evidences.
Now the same thing has started to rock athletics and that could be understandable given that like in football, there is no grassroots developmental efforts to discover talents in sports in the country, hence the authorities could accommodate any cheat to compete at any level.
This has been the issue with age group football teams in Nigeria.
Anthony Kojo Williams, former NFF chairman, while speaking to SUNDAY INDEPENDENT sometimes ago, spared no words in pinpointing where the problems come from. To Williams, it has to do with cheating at the developmental stage of age group competitions.
“I don’t see Nigerian football getting out of the quagmire, the problem it is in, today, is because corruption is getting deeper and deeper.
“From time to time we get flashes where we do well in some competitions with overage players and we celebrate. That was one of the issues I looked at; we can’t keep using overage players. We used over-age players for junior cham- pionships, I know that.
“Why not say it? It’s the truth. We always cheat. It’s a fact. When you cheat, you deprive the young stars that are supposed to play in these competitions their rights.”
Meanwhile, antecedents have shown that Nigeria has never been sincere in the choice of players for the age group competitions, particularly at the cadet level.
For instance, Chrisantus Macaulay, who won the Golden Boot at the 2007 U17 World Cup in South Korea, faded out as soon as he shone. Meanwhile, Bojan Krkic, who played in that same tourna- ment, won the Champions’ League with FC Barcelona, while Toni Kroos went on to win the World Cup and the Champions League. Kroos was 20 when he made his debut for Germany. He won the Golden Ball at that same U17 World Cup in Korea in 2007, which Nigeria won.
Nigeria’s Dele Ajiboye’ who saved two penalties in the final match of the same competition,
never was a member of the Su- per Eagles, even as his opposite number in that U17 final, David De Gea needs no introduction as far as global football is concerned.
Of that squad that played and won the 2007 U17 World Cup, it was only Lukman Haruna, who was able to break into the Super Eagles, but later struggled and eventually eclipsed by real younger players.
Xavi, Casillas, Robbie Keane, Ashley Cole, Santa Cruz, Seydu Keita, Ronaldinho, etc. played in Nigeria ‘99 U20 World Cup where they emerged champions but none of the players had earlier won the U17.
But Nigerian players at the Nigeria ’99 fizzled out as quickly as they appeared. Players like Pius Ikedia, Julius Aghahowa, who won silver and bronze ball, ended their senior careers in 2002, even though Joseph Yobo was able to make it to 2014.
However, it has been alleged that the public, including the press, put pressure on age group coaches who would dwell more on winning instead of going for talent discovery.
Consequently, SUNDAY INDEPENDENT finding has revealed that ninety percent of Nigerian players’ peak at the time they play the cadet championship, meaning that the players start experiencing diminishing returns when their performance should be upward.
Adokie Amiesimaka, former Super Eagles winger, said more on these sometimes ago, noting that the country allowed this in order to gain advantage. He said this after Nigeria played at the 2009 U17 World Cup hosted by Nigeria. In that championship, hitherto unknown Stanley Okoro, labeled Little Messi, shone like a million stars wherein he was alleged to have been far above the required age.
Amasiemaka said then: “Stanley Okoro, for instance, has no business in that team (2009 U17 World Cup in Nigeria), which everybody knows; he cannot be anything less than 33 or 34,” Amesiemaka, while criticizing the age of Nigerian players at that World Cup.
“Olarenwaju Kayode was also my player in the Sharks feeder team in 2002, he played alongside Fortune Chukwudi, both of them were mates, he too cannot be less than 29 or 30.
“Abdul Ajagun was one of the highest goal scorers in the league. He was also in Command Secondary School in Kaduna or so, he dropped out of school in SS2 in the 1990s and so cannot be U20.”
While admitting that age falsification in football and other sports in general is a global thing and also remained a menace, Ifeanyi Udeze, former Super Eagles defender, regretted the extent such is done in Nigeria, saying such won’t help the country’s sports development.
“As long as you were born in Nigeria before travelling to Europe to play football, you must have falsified your age,” Udeze said on his radio show (Ifeanyi Udeze’s Dairy) on Brila FM.
“It’s a common practice in Nigeria as well as most parts of Africa and South America, so it isn’t just a Nigerian thing.
“However, the bigger problem is how blatant some players do this thing in Nigeria. You’ll find footballers older than 35 posing as 18 years olds. Such won’t help to develop the game in our country,” he said.
Meanwhile, analysts have bemoaned that getting into athletics has signalled a very bad precedence that needs to be arrested if Nigerian sports would be rescued.
Meanwhile, stakeholders have pointed to grassroots sports development as the panacea towards reviving sports in the country.
The Abia Sports Council Director, Obioma George, attributed the decline in grassroots sports development to the neglect by the government.
He said; “In Abia, we have started sensitisation in the 17 LGAs with the Commissioner for Sports.
“The commissioner has directed that schools should devote at least two hours weekly for sports, thereafter, the inter school sports competition will start. I think that holds the key of Nigerian sports will come out of its current state,” he said.
Ike Shorunmu, former Super Eagles goalie, said the country must start from the school programmes if it hoped to get it right in sports development.
The former goalkeeper said the lack of funding and government’s commitment was the bane of the country’s sports development in recent times.
“Of course, there are lots of sports academies but it is much easier to get talents from schools because that is where you get their true age and the exceptional ones.
“We still need to go back to our school sports because it’s more real than what we see in the academy,” Shorumnu said.