Nigeria Content Online

Nigerian youngsters
wishing to turn to football as career have an opportunity to do so as
the Nigerian arm of renowned Aspire Academy for Sports Excellence,
based in Doha, Qatar, has thrown registration open for this year with
the project beginning next month.

Lamine Savane,
director of the project in Africa, told journalists in Lagos at the
weekend that the aim of the programme is to help youngsters fulfil
their dreams of playing football while at the same time getting
educated.

“We are here in
Nigeria because we believe there is a large pool of football talent
that need to be developed for the benefit of the game in the country,”
he said. “A lot of these children are yearning to play football but do
not have the opportunity to do so. Our aim is to give them that
opportunity and also to make it possible for them to get some
education.”

He noted that
Nigerian arm of the project, which started in 2007 with eleven young
Nigerians awarded educational scholarship at the academy in Doha, was
impacted positively on the families of the players. He stated that one
of the players in that first set, John Felagha from Bayelsa State, was
one of the goalkeepers in Nigeria’s silver winning U-17 team at last
year’s U-17 World Cup hosted by Nigeria.

Not a scam

Also speaking at
the occasion, Sam Ahmedu, a retired colonel in the Nigerian Army and
director of the project in Nigeria, said progress have been made by the
project in the country. He stated that at the moment, five of the
current set of players under scholarship with the project, have been
invited to the current Golden Eaglets squad being handled by Monday
Odigie.

“This project is
not like others you have where young players are exploited,” he said.
“Like we have always said, this is not one of those projects used to
siphon players abroad to be used for the national of Qatar. The Qataris
who are funding this project can afford to go to Brazil for instance
and buy players and get them to become Qatari citizens. It just one of
the ways they want to reach and help youth in different parts of
Africa.”

Giving details of
preparations for this season, Ahmedu said only children who are 13
years old are eligible to take part in the project.

Presently, there
are eleven Nigerians at the academy in Doha with one of them, Jasper
Uwaegbulam from Imo State distinguishing himself. Only recently he
scored four goals in match against the Qatari U-18 team.