The Godswill Akpabio Stadium in Uyo will today host the Nigeria/Ghana second leg tie of the final qualifying match of the African Nations Championship.
The first leg of the encounter ended goalless in Ghana and today the Super Eagles B team must record an outright win to be at the CHAN finals.
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A score draw could earn the Ghanaians a place in the finals and the way the Black Stars knocked out Super Eagles A team from the Qatar 2022 World Cup with a score draw is still fresh in the memory of Nigerian fans. The outcome of this tie will form part of the assessment of the 2024 calendar year.
The year 2024 has been full of ups and downs in the sports scene but, overall, it is clear the country lacks planning and foresight.
Year in, year out, same problems persist as the national teams struggle to participate in competitions just for representation and not for developmental purposes or getting results.
The male U-17 team that used to be the pride of the nation is no longer the same because there is little or no time to build this team into the expected standard.
And so in Year 2024, the ‘fire brigade’ nature of our sports administrators came to the fore with the poor results the country recorded in major events.
The Olympic Games, the biggest sports event in the world, took place this year in Paris, France but Team Nigeria finished without a single medal in all the disciplines the country took part in.
The then minister of sports, John Enoh, did not do well with the preparation of the athletes despite the N14bn he received from the Federal Government for the Games. It was a big shame that Nigeria failed to develop on the gains of Tokyo 2000 Olympics in which former minister Sunday Dare led the team to clinch silver and bronze in wrestling and athletics.
With the talents in the country, Team Nigeria can do much better but getting the athletes to start early preparation is a big issue.
The federations are not adequately funded and the real preparations for the Games was not up to two months, the same competition other countries spend three years to prepare for.
In Paris, Team Nigeria was involved in crises of all sorts rather than mounting the podium for medals. The Favour Ofili saga in which she was not registered for the 200m she qualified for was sad, just as a Nigerian cyclist had to borrow a bicycle to compete at the Games. Team Nigeria was in the news for the wrong reasons.
The women’s basketball team, D’Tigress, were the shining light for Nigeria as they recorded amazing upsets to be the first African team ever to play in the quarter-finals of the Games.
Overall, there are no concrete plans to identify and groom budding talents across all the sports federations. There is no calendar of activities and some of the federations did not even stage one national competition all through the year under review.
The year started with the Africa Cup of Nations in Cote d’Ivoire. The Super Eagles under Jose Peseiro were able to make it to the final but lost 2-1 to the hosts in a competition in which they recorded great victories against the Lions of Cameroon and Bafana Bafana of South Africa. Eagles’ skipper, William Troost-Ekong, was named the Player of the Tournament.
