NFF SHOULD IMPROVE SCOUTING

I always feel bad every time I discover the loss of another Nigerian player to a foreign country. With the kind of passion and enthusiasm I have about my beloved country, I always want the best for us so every time I see something nice pass us by I feel bad. And believe you me it is not just in football related matters.that I defend my country with pride. I am proudly Nigerian, but as far as this coulumn is concerned, let's face the football aspect of my patriotism.

Over the years we have lost a lot of very fine talent to other European countries. Some of them are born at home and then go ahead to make a name for themselves in their adopted countries and most after endless waits for a Super Eagles call up, are resigned to playing for their adopted countries just to be able to play international football.Others are born of Nigerian parentage in foreign lands and while a small majority of these group of players get to represent their native country Nigeria, others end up playing for their adopted countries.

One thing I have discovered from the top European cuntries is their eagerness to cap any bright talent they spot that is eligible to play for any other country. England and France are particularly fond of this act. The victorious French team at France 98 had a vast majority of players of African desent. Zinedine Zidane the finest player of his generation , Marcel Desaily, Patrick Vieira to mention but a few were African through and through yet World Champions with France.

What these countries did then was to set their scouts on alert and any top prospect that they feel may be of use to them in the near future they entice him to play for their juniour national teams. Because of the old rule that once you play for one country you cannot play for another national team that existed at that time, we lost a lot of boys that would have been quite useful to our cause. In England here, Ugo Ehiogu rose to the pinnacle of his game, playing for years in the Premiership and even though Nigeria knew he could do a good job for us, he ws not eligible to play for us because he had been capped by England at junior national level.

Others before him like John Fashanu had also been lost to European countries in strange manners. In Fash The Cash's case, he was called up to the then Green Eagles but was not giving a look in as the squad prepared for a game. He went back to his club Wimbledon where he earned a reputation as a bullish yet skillful centre forward, and England quickly capped him twice and made him ineligible for Nigeria, then abandoned him, never caring to extend another call up to him. Ghana lost Marcel Desailly in similar circumstances and he went on to play a much more prominent role for France.

A couple of years back FIFA changed the old rule so that players could, after being capped at junior national team level for one country, switch allegiance to another before they turn 21 years of age. When this was in place, I discovered Sone Aluko doing very well in the Scottish league where he is a main stay in the Aberdeen FC team. I immediately used my contacts in the NFF to get him a call up to the Super Eagles for the international friendly against The Republic of Ireland last May and he gave a good showing in the 75 minutes he played to make the technical crew include him in the squad for the rest of the World Cup qualifiers. He went ahead to represent Nigeria at the WYC U-20 tournament in September last year, and has every likelihood of making it into the Super Eagles soon.

Another change of the rules by FIFA now allows players to switch allegiance as long as they have never represented a country at senior national level no matter how old they are. This opened the door for people like Nedum Onuoha. I went all the way to Manchester City ON MY OWN without a penny from the NFF to find out from he if he was interested in playing for Nigeria. He sounded very much interested like any player at the prospect of playing at the world cup, even though the NFF later said he wanted to consider it and would not be available for the World cup. Well, you win some, you lose some. Tough luck!

Aside the players mentioned above, there are many many others. In the Bundesliga there is Dennis Aogo of Hamburg. I remember years back reading Seyi Olajengbesi point him out when they were playing for the same club in Germany as a star for the future, and that the boy would be interested in playing for Nigeria. Years later, no approach from the NFF until only recently, when we heard that he was approached and he rejected the offer.

Why wouldn't he, IF he did. When he was nobody in the lower rungs of the German league yet able to play regularly for the Germany junior national team nobody in Nigeria gave it a thought to approach him. When he was playing in the Bundesliga and had every prospect of breaking into the German senior national team, someone makes a half hearted approach for his services.

The bottom line here is that Nigeria lacks a scouting system. Look at David Alaba in the Bayern Munich first team at just 17 years of age. He already has a senior national team cap for Austria, which is not even the land of any of his parents. His father is Nigerian whuile his mum is Philipino but he was born in Austria. How could the NFF not spot him as he rose through the ranks in the Bayern Munich team to even approach him and let him know he was in our radar so that he would think twice about any appproach by any other national team?

The only scouting system the NFF have is the journalists. Unfortunaltely, most of our journalists are based in Nigeria. So how can they discover the youth players coming up the ranks abroad when they have not discovered the ones coming up under their noses in Nigeria? Na wa oh!

Over here in the UK, you hardly get to a Premeirship team without a Nigerian youngster coming up through the ranks. There is Tope Obadeyi at Bolton, Jonathan Obika at Tottenham Hotspurs and Chuks Aneke who is doing very well for the Arsenal youth team. What about Kelvin Etuhu, younger brother of Super Eagle'sDickson Etuhu who is a Manchester City player but currently on loan at Cardiff City.

In thelower ranks there are numerous ones like Tom Adeyemi who broke into the Norwich City team this year and played a prominent role in getting them promoted to the Championship. In fact, he was so good that at just 18 years of age, he was voted the Championship Manager Apprentice of the year for League One at the Football League Awards last month. Yet I can swear the NFF do not know a thing about him, and thus cannot even dream of approaching him now. Maybe they are waiting for him to mature and become a beautiful bride before they can show him some love.

I have repeatedly offfered my services to the NFF to be able to help them fish out these young stars coming up yet I have not received a single positive reply. I will continue to do my bit for Nigeria necause finally na Naija I dey do am for, no be NFF. But if you know any one who knows anone who knows anyone at the corridors of power in Nigerian football, please tell them that I am willing to serve my country in doing my best to help fish out these talents across the UK and even in Europefor the good of our football. Nigeria, HERE AM I, SEND ME!!

[This article was first published before the World Cup for Sports MAil, a Lagos based Sports newspaper.]