Football remains the king of sports as the game is deep but relatively easy but the joy and misery associated with it appears to be on parallel lines, IKENWA NNABUOGOR tries a personal insight…
As long as sports came into existence, football or soccer as the Americans would refer to it, remains the most popular as well as the most followed.
The English added football to the fast growing range of sports in the 1800s as the world became more and more involved with the round leather game for leisure and business as the years rolled into years.
Soon the game would spread to other parts of Europe as followership grew with the rest of the world welcoming the game.
Today, the game of football has grown to become a global sport as well as a massive money-spinning business grossing billions of dollars in public and private enterprises.
Football has turned individuals into billionaires, football clubs into global money-spinning brands as well as put host cities into sprawling hub of business while on the hand, it has sadly left some unhappy and miserable faces.
Though, football is growing in Africa, it is never any few kilometres away to catching up with Europe, the Americas and even Asia, but has left more sad faces than beautiful faces in it’s wake than any other continent.
This insight will dwell more in football in Africa because the perfect system in Europe has affected players’ lives more positively than negatively.
Tough beginning in Africa
The tough beginning in Africa has left more bitter tales to imagine as football players have had to go through untold hardships to make it in the sport.
Football system is almost totally non-existent in this part of the world, unlike in Europe and the Americas where players are meant to go through a system to mature into professional players.
Players are expected to graduate from youth and junior levels to senior level with a well mapped out programme to produce finished articles in players and for also good business.
With the game providing alternative means to livelihood than education which may be elusive due to harsh economic conditions sweeping Sub-Saharan Africa apart, players “smiled” through terrible tough beginnings to make it in football.
More have fallen on the way side than the successful ones, but the roads to such successes could be box office hits if adapted into movies.
Etim Esin’s biopic movie is reportedly on the pipelines to hit the movie industry before long.
The story of the Nigerian-born Cameroon international JohnMary Uzuegbunam truly encapsulates what a tough beginning looks like which could still be a source of inspiration to young and up-coming football players.
Onitsha was not going to give him the platform he needed to make it as a football player and someone suggested Cameroon would be the quicker route to stardom and his stories there are better imagined than told.
Abakaliki welcomed him first after living Onitsha with holes in his pockets and he spent some time in the dusty city playing with torn boots before he was set for the tortous voyage on the Atlantic, from Oron to Cameroon.
Life wasn’t also better in Cameroon as JohnMary would never forget the assistance he received from a Catholic Reverend Father in the church where he slept while praying for miracles.
The rest is history, as the newly-signed Al-Shabbab star would finally leave the shores of Africa to Buriram United in Thailand before he arrived Serbia for a massive turnaround in his highly successful career.
Lack of proper system means the journey to stardom could sometimes require divine intervention and unlucky ones are left wallowing in misery.
Japan-based star Peter Utaka only lifted his game from academy football to non-leaguers UNTH Enugu as he had deal with brutal limited opportunities.
Though he would eventually make it as a successful player, it was not without the hardships he endured in UAE, Egypt and Croatia.
The former OB Odense striker would always spare some thoughts to his youth football mates whom he said were equally as good or even better.
Utaka grabbed the platform his older brother John provided for him to break away from the poor unbearable system back home to first Egypt, then UAE, and Croatia before settling down to club football at third-tier Belgian side Patro Maasmechelen.
Luck Over Everything
The system in Africa, especially in Sub-Sahara leaves the beautiful game actors with no choice than to hang on to mother luck than ability and most times mother luck has smiled on them.
Talents abound in Africa no doubt, but the lack of infrastructures has completely left players at the mercy of circumstances which may turn out kind or unkind.
Many a times the success of some African players have depended on their coaches during the formative years and bad news for the players should they find themselves in the bad books of coaches who would not play them for no good reason.
The cases of Nwankwo Kanu and Austin ‘Jay Jay’s Okocha were sweet combination of luck and talent.
Kanu would have had his talent brutally chequered if luck hadn’t forced its way into the driver’s seat of his career after a coach at the defunct NEPA FC Lagos, told him point blank that he was not good enough and should go and look for another job to do.
A written-off Kanu would go on to not only become two-time African Player of the Year, but went on to become the most decorated Nigerian player alive.
‘Jay Jay’ only lifted his game despite his supreme talent from non-leaguers Co-operative Commerce Bank, CCB FC, when his older brother Emma Okocha, who was a cult figure at Enugu Rangers that his younger must be signed or no deal with the seven-time NPFL champions.
Ex-junior international Biniebi Numa completed ‘Jay Jay’s journey to stardom when he received the former PSG star in Germany and the rest, they say, is history.
Former Super Eagles striker Emmanuel Emenike rode similar Kanu’s luck to big time football that had him grace the glamorous English Premier League and the money-spinning Turkish and Russian leagues.
Delta Force FC didn’t put any money in his pockets, but added to his early development as a youngster as he would stretch his luck further afield to South Africa as his search for fortunes in the beautiful game took another turn.
Emenike’s trajectory was more of accident than academic as his coach at a local side made up of Nigerians in South Africa gave him his rudest shock of his life when he told him he was not good enough for his team that couldn’t even be found in the football pyramid in South Africa.
The disappointment turned into luck as Mpamalanga Black Aces signed him up soon after and the rest of his stories left sweet memories, club and personal titles as well as mega millions in his bank balances.
Talent isn’t everything
Attitude and good conduct are priceless, while talent remains criminally limited and lots of players have lost their way with only memories of short-term successes if there were any to remember.
Football provides no room for players with poor attitude and no sweet stories have told of any who courted more troubles than success on the pitch.
Just like every facet of life, football does not provide a level playing ground for players lacking in discipline which is the major asset for any player to be successful.
Though, there are few exceptions – France’s Eric Cantona and Brazilian superstar Romario were notable names in the beautiful game who despite their penchants for being on the wrong side of the law of the game, they stood to be counted for their distinguished careers filled with laurels.
In as much as the players with bad energies are important to their clubs, it’s a matter of time before management throws them away and this could spell the sad end of the player.
Even when the management and the coach got their hands tied, the team mates and the fans may not be in bed with their troubles and their sad end is always not pleasing to the ears.
Esin is regarded as one of the most talented players to come out of Nigeria, but his documented catalogue of disciplinary issues would eventually put paid to his once promising career.
He would head back to Nigeria from Belgium where he last played for Lierse after he was accused of rape and never got his groove back.
Unkind
The game of football probably has more cases of riches-to-rags tales as players are caught in this wicked web of terrible career and financial management to leave sad stories for references.
Football has been unkind to many a special talent who ended up seriously bankrupt and needing financial assistance from government and individuals.
There have been players who were more in bed with lavish lifestyles than securing their financial future and most often these players end up in penury.
The lucky ones get help from government and individual for rehabilitations mostly necessitated by booze and drugs’ use, while the unlucky ones are left out of the largesse are abandoned to their fate with little or no help.
This is so because some of them actually did turn their backs on their contemporaries who were struggling to catch up and even in their home towns, leaving some aggrieved minds to pray for their downfall to get their pound of flesh.
Life after football is tough and most challenging and most do not have the capacity to cope because they failed to prepare for retirement when the millions were hitting their bank accounts.
Most have struggled with the inevitable transition from their active playing days to their post-careers because they failed to plan for the harsh challenges of life after football.
Smart players especially the ones surrounded by the “right” people already know where they will position themselves when their careers are over and begin to prepare for it in good time.
Sometime, the transition runs into a hitch as the actors are indecisive of the career paths they wish to pursue when they are retired but not tired.
Sadly, the unlettered are the worst hit in the tough post-career lives that have come to stay among football players in Nigeria and beyond as they have ended up in misery.
Zambian star Elijah Litana would wish he came back to life a better financial manager of the millions of dollars he received in Saudi Arabia as he was reported to be very poor and living from hand to mouth.
The lanky defender was a “king” at top Saudi club Al Hilal and had the world at his feet even dining and wining with the Sheikhs in the oil-rich kingdom, where he played for the richest and most successful but he was so carried away he forgot to invest and secure his financial future.
Bad as it turned out to be, Litana would receive some change from the BBC reporter that traced him to his Lusaka base for a chat to underline the sad end of the once promising superstar defender, who is only 51.
The case of former Golden Eaglets captain Wilson Oruma was that of a bad unkind date with fraudsters, who scammed him of his fortune in a reported failed oil business that has left the former Marseille midfielder in financial tatters.
Former Gabros midfielder Franklin Lokam could be the receiver of football unkindest jab as he has had to battle mental problems as a victim of an alleged bribery in the Nigeria’s Olympic team.
The Akwa-Ibom born playmaker who was once compared to ‘Jay Jay’ couldn’t take the brutal harshness of failure to raise cash to bribe the handlers and succumbed to mental and psychological challenges thereafter.
Little has been heard of the fast rising star whose short-lived Gabros stay is still well remembered.
Riches, financial havens
Some of the biggest attractions to the beautiful game are the riches, the splendour and financial Eldorado the successful players have come to enjoy, but with a huge caveat to welcome the millions- discipline and financial investments.
Talking about the fast cars in exquisite garages, the properties, the businesses and even fast women, football guarantees all that, but the player must work to achieve it.
The rags-to-riches tales are sweet to tell when the players arrive with the mega cash to secure their financial future for life.
The millions that swell the bank balances weekly take a walk when the players are retired and will continue to maintain his lifestyle even when he’s retired if he actually did the needful by investing properly.
Back home in Nigeria, not too many of the retired players maintain their career rich lifestyles, but quite a good number of them can boast of living large even after their careers are over.
Associations by corporate bodies have also helped them to maintain their living standard as more cash rolls in from media commercials and brand ambassadorships as well as appointments on boards in the public and private sectors.
Surely, all that glitters is not gold in the beautiful game of football, but the players must do their bit to leave a lasting impact both on the pitch and outside it.
