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The questions began
almost as soon as Qatar won the right to host football’s 2022 World Cup.
How will a tiny, gas-rich Gulf Arab state cope with an influx of
hundreds of thousands of football fans? How will the fans cope with the
searing summer heat? What about drinking in a conservative Muslim
society?

For most Qataris,
the world’s most watched sporting event represents a chance to offer a
new image of their homeland and the wider Middle East.

“This is not just
for Qatar, but for the whole region,” Sheikha Mozah bint Nasser Al
Missned, wife of the country’s ruler, told Reuters in an interview.

“This is an
opportunity to eradicate misconceptions, not just about Qatar, but about
the wider Islamic and Arab world. We are a very welcoming country, a
young nation. And we are not just dreamers, we are achievers.”

Alcohol no issue?

But the questions
are likely to continue right up to the World Cup itself. Take alcohol,
which many fans see as part of the football experience.

Although not “dry”
like neighbouring countries such as Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, alcohol is
served only at elite hotels in Qatar, and public drunkenness is
prohibited. Will the rules be relaxed in twelve years time?

Bid organisers have promised that some concessions will be made.

“The bid committee
has done its homework. We recognised that there would have to be some
allowances in (alcohol) availability. It’s not especially looking
forward to hordes of drunken football fans behaving in an antisocial
way, but no country welcomes that,” said Mike Lee, a consultant who
advised Qatar on the bid and helped London win the 2012 Olympics and Rio
those in 2016.

“Qatar is an
environment where Westerners are welcome, and already has a large expat
population. Not only is alcohol readily available at hotels, but for the
period of the World Cup it would be offered in other areas as well,”
Lee said.

Expats currently comprise about 80 percent of Qatar’s population of 1.7 million.

Consumption of
alcohol is likely to be largely ignored by the country’s predominantly
young population, as it is swept away with the euphoria of hosting the
competition, many believe.

“Around 50 to 60
percent of the population are aged in their 20s or below, so they are
more tolerant and I think they will embrace the event as a whole,” said
Sultan al-Qassemi, an Emirati social commentator based in the United
Arab Emirates.

The number of
outlets serving alcohol in Qatar is likely to increase over the next 12
years, Qassemi said, while a planned $3 billion 40-kilometre causeway to
Bahrain, where alcohol is more freely available, may also make it
easier to bring drink into the country.

Importing alcohol
into Qatar is currently illegal. Government and bid officials have not
said whether this will change prior to the tournament or for its
duration.

“I imagine that they
will set up areas for conspicuous alcohol consumption; a bit like how
they divide off restaurant areas in Dubai malls during Ramadan,” said
David B. Roberts, a researcher at Durham University in the UK.

“(Qatar’s Emir) came
to power largely, though not exclusively, by successfully courting
younger generations. Sport played a significant role in this. His
calculation is that Qataris will be proud enough of Qatar hosting the
World Cup to forgive him the liberalising of the laws,” Roberts said.

Ferocious summer

Then there’s the heat, which in summer can soar to above 50 degrees Celsius, making even crossing the street a challenge.

Although the
tournament will be played during the two hottest months of the year, bid
organisers say the heat inside the stadia will not be an issue, thanks
to climate-controlled, zero-carbon-emitting stadiums.

The country plans to
harness solar-powered technology to cool stadia to about 27 Celsius on
the pitch – a system that has worked on one small stadium in Qatar but
is yet to be proved on bigger buildings.

How fans will cope outside the stadia, however, is another matter.

“The bid committee
and government have been very astute about bringing in engineers,
architects, and designers. Given the technology they’ve already
developed, it could very well also be possible to air condition fan
zones, not just the stadia,” Lee said.

Though World Cups
are traditionally held during the northern hemisphere’s summer months
after the end of domestic league competitions, some have suggested that
the event take place in January, when temperatures are a comfortable 25
degrees.

“Plans for the
biggest leagues would have to change for 2022, but that would not be a
major undertaking,” FIFA executive committee member, Franz Beckenbauer,
said recently in comments to German newspaper, Bild.

Bid committee and government officials are yet to comment on such a move.

In its technical report, FIFA cited Qatar’s intense summer heat as a potential health risk for players and spectators.

“In my view, FIFA
has sold out the heritage of the World Cup – their coffers might be full
at the end of it, but morally they have bankrupted themselves by
totally ignoring what their own inspectors said about the unsuitability
of the place to host the tournament,” said one UK-based soccer analyst.

The decision to
award the event to Qatar, made amidst allegations of collusion, drew
much media criticism, particularly from the British press.

Two FIFA executive
committee members were banned and fined over allegations they had
offered to sell their votes in the vote to host the 2018 and 2022 World
Cups. But FIFA’s ethics committee, which investigated allegations of
collusion, found no evidence that Spain and Portugal’s joint bid, which
lost out on the right to host the 2018 Cup, had cut a deal with Qatar.

Ready to spend

Qatar says it will
prove it is a worthy host. Over the next five years, it plans to build a
$25 billion rail network, a $5.5 billion deep water seaport, and a new
airport for $11 billion which will be connected with big new residential
and commercial projects in the northern part of the capital, Doha, by a
$1 billion crossing. It will also spend an additional $20 billion on
new roads.

For the World Cup,
plans are in place to complete a metro system connecting each stadium by
2017 with venues no more than one hour apart from each other.

“The Qatar team made
a very conscious decision to bid for 2022 and not 2018, whereas several
bidders put themselves into both. They knew they were going to need a
decade to deliver everything,” Lee said.

Blessed with
abundant hydrocarbon resources – the country contains the world’s third
largest gas reserves and is the largest exporter of liquefied natural
gas (LNG) – it has poured much of the windfall from LNG exports into
education and cultural projects.

It hosts a cluster
of elite Western universities, a scientific research park filled with
blue-chip energy companies, and a much-lauded museum of Islamic art. It
plans a host of other museums, including one designed by famed French
architect, Jean Nouvel.

“What struck me
about Qatar was that they really do want to put these resources to very
good purposes. It’s not a question of just letting the oil and gas
flow,” Lee said.

“The international
and media interest in Qatar will now be tremendous. Rather than focusing
on the political troubles in the region, the win is an opportunity to
talk about what a country can achieve if it uses its resources in the
right way,” he further said.

Altering perceptions

“With the world
watching, Qatar will want to send a clear message: we deserved this,
we’re going to make the most out of it, and we’re going to show everyone
a different side of the Arab world,” said Shadi Hamid, director of
research at Brookings Doha Centre, the Qatar branch of the Washington
think tank.

To this end, Qatar’s
bid committee put a woman, Sheikha Mozah, at the heart of the final
presentation, a move which some analysts believe impressed the
committee. The only other bid to do that was Russia, winner of the 2018
tournament.

Bid CEO, Hassan
Al-Thawadi, also promised that Israel would be welcomed to compete. FIFA
would not have entertained a bid from Qatar if there was any suggestion
that Israel, shunned by most of the Arab world, would not be allowed to
compete if it qualified.

A shared cup?

FIFA president, Sepp
Blatter, recently suggested that Qatar could host the event with
neighbouring Gulf countries. But observers in the region say that it is
unlikely the Gulf state will share the glory.

“Obtaining the World
Cup is the apogee of Qatar’s policies in the past decade, where they
have shown a single-minded determination to publicise themselves as much
as possible, primarily to boost Qatar’s soft power,” Roberts said.

“The Gulf is a competitive place. Hosting the World Cup, the
publicity it will bring, the contacts that will be made, the money on
offer, the kudos and respect that hosting a successful event will bring,
may prove a massive competitive advantage,” he added.

Post World Cup 2010
in South Africa,and consequent to the less than average performance of
the Super Eagles at the Mundial, Nigerians sort of asked for the heads
of Sani Lulu and his NFF Board.

Official reaction to
this was not very clear but by some abracadabra, Sani Lulu was
impeached from the position of President, his Vice-President Mr. Amanze
Uchegbulam and Chairman Technical Committee, Chief Taiwo Ogunjobi went
with him while the rest of the equally culpable Board remained and Aminu
Maigari emerged as Acting President then. Honestly I wondered why the
rest of the Board that is guilty of inaction while the three top
officials impeached took all decisions and quite frankly ran a
triumvirate while the others, mere mortals just looked on helplessly and
mum only to back an impeachment exercise! The Lulu/Maigari Board joint
tenure having expired, an election was conducted with some bizarre and
unexplainable alignment of interests. New and old godfathers pushed
their influences against one another. Zoning options weighed against
competence and reason. The good and growth of the game were very distant
considerations. There was horse-trading, subterfuge and high level
intrigues.

Aminu Maigari who
led the impeachment of Sani Lulu emerged President with the strong
support of Sani Lulu! Delegates loyal to Sani Lulu voted for Maigari
because the latter had ‘apologized’ to Lulu. Incredible but it happened.

On ascension,
Maigari has been yoked with the balancing of all interests. And he
appears to be doing just well. With shrewdness and calmness even if with
a not so colourful mien,

Maigari is pushing on. Invitation to Ex-Eagles Victor Ikpeba, Christian Chukwu,

Austin Jay-Jay Okocha and a significantly populist move, the appointment of Samson Siasia as Super Eagles’ coach.

Young Shehu Dikko
was said to have rejected election support in return for concessions and
so lost out. Tijani Yusuf candidate of Capo De Tuti Capo,

Amos Adamu, got the
rude shock when his alter ego abandoned him or so it was claimed in the
media. Neutrals like Fan Ndubuoke, Lumumba Adeh and former
Secretary-General Alhaji Sani Toro were just as astounded by what went
on in the name of election into the NFF Board.

Well, howsoever,
Aminu Maigari emerged NFF President but not before the National
Association of Nigerian Footballers (NANF) had gone to Court to
challenge the holding of the elections, the legality or otherwise and
with sundry prayers asking for its rights denied in the substantive
suit. An order of Court putting the election on hold was violated and
contempt charges pressed against principal actors at the election. FIFA
ignited by the goings-on in our football purportedly issued a ban threat
and then followed with a “ban” vide a letter that was distinctly
Nigerian in wordings. The authenticity of that ban order is still not
convincing,

wearing very much
the gab of self-serving device of certain interest group. The truth
about that FIFA “ban” will emerge some day as many things about that
corrupt body have begun to do.

Activities in our
football appear to wake up as more actors emerge in an effort to resolve
the logjam. The Presidency’s concern manifests in Sports Minister Isa
Ibrahim Bio’s laboured efforts to put things right. Parties to the
dispute, stakeholders, respected past F.A leaders were consulted and a
roadmap to sanity appeared to have been described. NANF agreed and did
withdraw its suit from the Court with the understanding that certain
issues had to be resolved in its favour by the Maigari Board. Details of
what transpired therefrom appeared not to have been or re-lived the
spirit of the ‘settlement’ brokered by Sports minister, Isa Bio.

Ogunye weighing in

I thought at the
time and still believed Isa Bio merely played Pontius Pilate and leaving
room for more unrest. That restiveness is emerging again with a new
suit instituted by Jiti Ogunye dragging the National Association of
Nigerian Footballers and others to Court.

In a new suit filed
by Ogunye, a Legal Practitioner, the Court is being asked to determine
if the settlement between NFF and NANF amounted to the vacation or
setting aside of a specific order of Court annulling the election of
Aminu Maigari’s Board. Joined as Co-defendants are the Minister of
Sport, Mr. Isa Bio, Dr. (Sir) Patrick Ekeji, Director-General NSC, Aminu
Maigari and his Board, the NFF electoral committee, the
Attorney-General of the Federation and the Inspector-General of Police.
No date has been fixed for hearing. An interesting scenario is on the
cards when legal hostilities open in this matter.

Meanwhile, a
sub-plot is being stoked by people inside and outside the NFF. Coming
from one of Maigari’s concessions for support at the election is that
the seat of NPL Chairman would go to somebody in Sani Lulu’s camp, Taiwo
Ogunjobi to be precise, so he can as statutes prescribe come into the
NFF Board as second Vice-President. A rather preposterous back route for
Ogunjobi NFF Board and to be Lulu’s eyes in Maigari’s Board. It is
suffering a set-back though as their joint efforts to remove the
incumbent NPL Chairman Davidson Owumi by all means possible even in
clear violation of FIFA doctrine of non-interference is not going easy.

Baribote, another
aggrieved party is heading to Court to claim his rights, Sani Lulu and
his men are at the Court of Arbitration, Chief Segun Odegbami MON has a
strong case against FIFA pending at the Court of Arbitration (CAS),
Aminu Maigari is standing on the Ibidapo Obe Arbitration Panel
resolutions to send Owumi packing. And we are waiting to see if NANF
withdrawal of its substantive suit against Maigari’s NFF discharges the
annulment order and all the interjections as Jiti Ogunye appears to have
gone to court to interpret and or enforce.

These are my reasons
for saying our football is in quicksand and sinks deeper with competing
interests awaiting resolution today, tomorrow and perhaps for sometime
to come. The court will decide rightly I think?

After bidding for
the Nigeria Premier League twice and losing out to rival, Globacom,
telecommunications firm, MTN Nigeria, on Thursday, won the rights to
sponsor the Nigeria Premier League for four seasons.

Details of the
agreement have yet to be made public, however, MTN is said to have made
a commitment to pay N2.6 billion over the next four years to the
league. The deal will come as a relief to beleaguered Chairman of the
league, Davidson Owumi, given that Rumson Baribote, former Chairman of
Bayelsa United is contesting the legality of the NPL elections that
threw up Owumi as chairman, in the courts.

The battles

The rivalry between
the two telecoms companies over sponsorship of the league started as
far back as 2006 when for the first time the league came up for
sponsorship. MTN were initially thought to have wrapped up the deal
with a sponsorship fee of N300m. That was not to be as Glo, reportedly
availing itself of contacts in the Presidency, won the bid with an
offer of N70 million. When the contract lapsed in 2008 under Oyuiki
Obaseki, a new deal brokered by MTN for N500m failed with Globacom
retaining sponsorship.

In January 2010,
former league boss, Obaseki, had led his team to Globacom to
re-negotiate the sponsorship. Globacom complained that having spent
millions in league sponsorship, they were not getting the desired
results. Therefore it was not a surprise when the 2010/11 season
arrived and Globacom pulled out of the sponsorship deal. The NPL again
threw its doors open for new sponsors. This time around, MTN, floored
twice by Globacom, decided not to show its hands openly electing to use
a front, an organisation known as Total Promotions to push its bid.
Total Promotions already does business with the league, having signed a
deal with the NPL over broadcast of league matches. After two days of
intense negotiations, news emerged that MTN had clinched the deal ahead
of its rival.

“It is a good one.
It shows that there is still potential for the league if MTN can do
business with the NPL,” said Emeka Nwani, Head of Media, NPL. “We are
assuring Nigerians that the money will be used judiciously for the
improvement of the league.” The NPL has debts of over N700 million as
part of recurrent expenditure as they are yet to be paid for last
season’s sponsorship. The former sponsors, Globacom, are reportedly
owing N923 million for the 2009/10 season.

Monkey business

While Nigerians
await a formal announcement of the new deal, there are indications that
the last may not have been heard of the matter. Globacom is not taking
the latest development lying down. An official of the organisation, who
asked not to be named, said “The last has not been heard of the matter.
The entire process has been less than satisfactory. We have a situation
where one company put it in a bid and then another organisation, which
did not formally enter the race, is said to have won the bid.” Attempts
to reach Shehu Gusau, the Chairman of the bid committee, to explain to
clarify whether the rules permit the use of fronts, proved
unsuccessful. Equally, efforts to contact Owumi were unsuccessful as
his mobile phone was switched off.

MTN used to sponsor the Africa Cup of Nations and the CAF Champions League tournaments in Africa and the Zambia Premier League.

I
have attended football events in Nigeria for many years but I have not
been as impressed and hopeful as I have become after attending the
Nigeria International Football Expo, organised jointly by Fairplay and
Vantgarde — two marketing companies run by very intelligent and
energetic young Nigerians.

When in the middle
of this year Justin Ofor, Managing Director of FairPlay called me to
say that he and some associates of his were going to organise a
football expo in December, I was sceptical of the chance of success of
such a venture. My fear was not because I thought he didn’t have the
resources to pull it, rather, it was from the fact that he had been
away in London for a while and I wasn’t sure he would successfully
navigate his way around the difficult terrain that Nigerian football
and business had become.

That fear has
proved unfounded and last Thursday I participated in an expo that
introduced fresh perspectives on how Nigerian football should be run as
profitable business. The speakers chosen by Ofor and his partners, the
ebullient Helen Emore, Chief Executive Officer of Vantgarde and Wole
Oyewo, the Executive Director, were top notch.

Interesting presentations

It was a departure
from the usual style where vacuous speeches are made and delegates fall
asleep in the middle of proceedings due to boring presentations. Two
presentations that engaged my attention were the papers presented by
Usen Udoh, a senior director with Accenture and Alex Goma, Managing
Director of PZ Cussons.

The presentations
titled, ‘Remodelling the football industry through public private
partnerships (Infrastructure, Management and Marketing)’ and ‘Marketing
Football in Nigeria: Media,

Sponsorship,
Events, Merchandising and Endorsements’ respectively knocked the bottom
off the ideology of many football managers. It thrashed the belief by
many football administrators that money belonging to companies
operating in the private sector was theirs for the taking simply
because Nigerians including some of the managers of these clubs, were
football crazy.

The point, according to the two speakers, is profit.

“There is no free
lunch. Businesses exist to make profit and in so far as companies want
to be in involved in CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility), their
primary aim is to make profit. So, if managers of football want to
attract sponsorship to the game, they must let the companies know what
is in it for them. They must talk about a plan, balance sheet and they
must talk about P and L (Profit and Loss),” Udoh said in his
presentation.

Biggest impediment

The responsibility
that this places on managers of football in Nigeria is to be diligent
enough to articulate a plan of action for driving the game. The biggest
impediment to the growth of the game particularly in the area of
attracting private sector participation has always been the
misconception that no matter what happens, the private sector can
always be counted upon to provide funds for the administration of the
game given Nigerians’ passion for it.

As we have seen in
the last one year or so, companies have held on tightly to their cheque
books. Whatever has flowed from them to Nigerian football has come in
trickles and are not enough to influence any meaningful development of
the game. What has also emerged from the expo is the need for
administrators of football in Nigeria to give serious thought to
branding as a vehicle for creating value for their products.

Image is everything

From what has
happened in the country in the last six months or so, it is clear that
our football managers do not have the faintest idea of the role
integrity plays in getting businessmen to do business with them. We
have seen for instance how the Nigerian Football Federation (NFF), the
body saddled with the responsibility of running football in the
country, has suddenly become a theatre of war on account of the
ambition of a few individuals.

In the Nigeria
Premier League, (NPL) the struggle for power has left the league
without sponsors with the league in its sixth week. Yet, the NPL hopes
to attract sponsors to their venture Now, which right thinking
businessman would want to do business with the NPL under such
conditions?

Like Goma rightly pointed out the issue of image is key.

“In attracting the
private sector, branding plays a key role. Organisations are mindful of
the kinds of bodies they go into partnership with. No company will go
into partnership with a body to sponsor an event that will erode their
brand. So, if football managers want to get sponsorship, they must up
their brand,” he said.

Our football
managers must make the game attractive enough. They have in their hands
a property that can generate billions for them annually and then they
won’t have to worry about grovelling before officials of the National
Sports Commission (NSC) simply because they want their activities
funded.

For the organisers
of the expo, they should go a step further to make available to
football administrators a comprehensive report of proceedings at the
expo including the papers presented and the contributions made by
panellists and guests. This information will be of immense benefit in
charting a way forward for football as business in Nigeria.

Of course, we should not pretend that this will necessarily occasion
an overnight change in the present situation. Like Mumini Alao, Chief
Executive Officer of Complete Communications, publishers of Complete
Sports, said in his paper, ‘Restructuring the regulatory framework for
football business in Nigeria’, we need to put in place legislation that
would guide the conduct of football as business so that in the main,
the army of profiteers who take advantage of the lax regulatory
environment to milk Nigerian football are reined in.

Please permit me to
make myself absolutely clear as regards the state of sports in Nigeria.
In as much as I have decided and I am totally committed to the
development of sports in Nigeria, I do not wish for a moment to be
branded as a pessimist. I do not also want to be part of the problems,
or to be seen to contribute to the problems that Nigerian sports is
experiencing currently. I see myself as a source of solutions and not
of problems to sports. To achieve this however, I have come to realize
that the truth has to be told and wisdom has to be applied in order to
get the message across.

Dancing around the solution

Yes, indeed, and we
will explain. Horses are extremely strong beasts of burden.They are
also very fast when it comes to running and can get violent if need be.
Tie a rope around the neck of a horse and fasten the rope to the trunk
of a tree. In due course, the horse begins to walk about and around the
tree trunk as a natural animalistic tendency. In most cases, the horse
moves in just one direction, hence the rope with which the horse is
tied to the tree is eventually wound around the tree trunk and the
movement of the horse is stopped. The horse thus finds itself comatose.
This is why it is generally believed that a horse is full of muscles,
but with a little brain. Those who are apostles of sports development
will agree that sports as it is being administered in Nigeria today can
be appropriately likened to the horse described above. If care is not
taken, very soon, the shallow and unkempt pool producing the athletes
representing this great nation at international and national
competitions, will dry up.

Assessing the growth

A critical
assessment of football, table tennis, tennis and boxing, may offer us a
vivid picture of the unfortunate situation. Football, like most other
sports in Nigeria, is all about noise and negative motions. Football
management in Nigeria has been so compromised that it will take the
divine intervention of God for the beautiful game to be rescued from
the grip of the cabal who seem to be presently in charge — albeit,
illegitimately. Whereas billions of tax payers’ monies are being
intentionally wasted on football promotion, the foundation on which the
pyramid of football development is built has been stupidly and
ignorantly ignored. Even at the age-grade level with age falsification,
it is all about perambulating and no progress that will encourage our
children who are naturally and divinely endowed with massive
potentials, to pursue football playing as a career.

How for instance,
for the sake of the future of Nigerian sports and the sake of our
children, should the councillor in charge of the ministry of
agriculture, be in charge of sports in some local government areas?

This is the extent
to which sports — especially football has been abused and trivialized
by politicians. Those in charge of schools’ sports are also insincere
about searching and grooming talents that abound in our schools.
Whereas there is genuine synergy between education and sports in some
other parts of the world, the opposite is the case here. All we hear is
that the Nigerian Schools Sports Federation (NSFF) is either executing
a jamboree referred to a sports festival,or embarking on a tour of some
foreign nations. There is nothing developmental at all in these
junketing.

Promotions instead of training

One very important
point we would like to stress at this point is the fact that we are not
at all against the several football competitions unscrupulously
organised. The point is that in football, for instance, mere
participation in matches does not guarantee the improvement or
development of young football players. What these young ones need at
this stage is an exposure to the scientific rudiments of football
playing in such a non-threatening and fun-spiced manner, that they will
be able to express themselves and enjoy playing the beautiful game.
This makes them believe in themselves and the coaches and trainers
handling them. Do we have such coaches/trainers in our schools or at
what we erroneously refer to as grassroots football academies in
Nigeria? I doubt it and confess that I am one of those to be held
responsible for this. I can’t believe I have spent so much time and
space just perambulating around issues concerning age-grade football,
while I thought we would be dealing with table tennis, tennis and
boxing today. Meanwhile, there is still so much to discuss on the state
of football in Nigeria.

So much to talk and do about how to actualize the process of
developing football in Nigeria, instead of wasting money, time and
effort on promotions. One thing is absolutely clear anyway. Between
every two different days is a very dark night. Nigerians cannot afford
to forget so quickly that Nigeria’s glorious past was the result of a
broad-based developmental programme, which was the product of a sound
administration, which recognised that excellence was a function of
early identification of talent. Our sports life is going through a
night after a very glorious day we have been referring to as the
past/lost glorious era. This night will definitely pass away and a new
dawn will emerge. All will be well.

Though the Super Eagles moved up one spot to finish the year in
32nd position, the performance for the period is the worst finish in a year-end
for the country’s national team in the last six years.

The Eagles started the year with yet another third place finish
at the Nations Cup in Angola, and also failed to make it beyond the first round
of the first World Cup on African soil, hosted recently by South Africa,
amongst other disappointing performances in the course of the year. While some
have blamed the handlers of the team for the woes, others have faulted the
commitment level of most of the players that make up the team. Already, the new
coach, Samson Siasia, has promised sweeping changes in the team in a bid to
make the Eagles soar again.

The country’s best year-end finish in the last six years was in
2006 when the country was rated 9th in the world. However, the team failed to
make it to the World Cup in Germany that year and also finished 3rd in the
Nations Cup hosted by Egypt.

This scenario has made some football fans question the
reliability of the monthly FIFA rankings to adequately rate the performance or
achievement of the Eagles. Egypt remains the continent’s highest ranked team in
9th position, while Ghana is in second place and is ranked 16th. Cote D Ivoire
occupy third spot in 21st position, followed by Nigeria and Algeria in 4th and
5th spot respectively in the continent.

Top finishers

World champions, Spain, finished the year in top spot as the
upper reaches of the latest rankings reflect the teams’ performances at the
2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa. Runners-up, the Netherlands, are in second
place; followed by semi-finalists, Germany, who have bumped Brazil out of third
place.

For the third year in a row, Spain are the Team of the Year,
while the Netherlands have claimed the title of Best Mover of the Year for the
team that earned the most points in 2010. Other teams have also caused a stir
outside the top ten. Montenegro, who just a year ago were ranked 74th, gained
368 points to finish the year in 25th position. Botswana were also successful,
starting the year in 118th position and ending it in 53rd.

African soccer, which failed again to get past the quarter-final
barrier at the 2010 World Cup, reached its first senior global final on
Tuesday. The Club World Cup may not have the prestige of FIFA’s big showcase
tournament for national teams, but African champions TP Mazembe were relishing
their achievement.

The team from the Democratic Republic of Congo upset South
America champions Internacional of Brazil 2-0 in an exciting semi-final of the
seven-team tournament at the Mohammad bin Zayed stadium.

“I think the whole team were playing very well… I went to talk
to them (at halftime and said) ‘now this is not Brazil which they are saying,
you are better then them, you can do better than them, just like in the Bible
David killed Goliath’,” club chairman Moise Katumbi Chapwe said.

“It was not an easy game, no one gave us a chance, they think
you are coming to lose,” the smartly dressed 46-year-old businessman and
politician told reporters.

“I prepared this team (from) a long time ago and they started
from the age of 16 so this is the result.” Coach Lamine N’Diaye, who is from
Senegal, said African soccer had been progressing steadily and its day had
come.

“Yesterday (Monday), I said this day was not far away and I
believed it. I asked the players ‘do you want to achieve something?'” N’Diaye
told the post-match news conference.

“It’s high time that Africa was taken seriously. We have eyes,
arms, legs, a head and we can think,” he said.

“We knew we were a great team, we just needed a place to show
it. In Africa, it’s already big to win the Champions League twice in a row.”

TP Mazembe, founded in 1939 by Benedictine monks, have twice won
successive African Champions League titles, the first time in 1967 and 1968.

“To win is always nice but here that takes on a bigger
dimension,” N’Diaye said. “We have players with talent and conviction… These
players are easy to coach.

“Last year we came here to get experience, this year it was to
do better,” he added.

Mazembe finished sixth last year after losing their quarter-final 2-1 to
Pohang Steelers of South Korea and the fifth-place playoff to surprise team
Auckland City.

The International Education Week organized by the International
Inspiration Club of the Federal Science and Technical College, Yaba, ended on a
colourful note on Wednesday.

The event which got
underway on Monday with a football match between FSTC and Bright Future Science
School that ended in a 6-1 victory for the hosts, served as an opportunity for
the participants to express their leadership skills through sports and play.

On Tuesday, a seven’s rugby game was played by the boys and the
girls. The first match was played between the female rugby team from FSTC and
their counterparts from Queens College, Lagos.

The girls from Queens College were at first all fired up,
encouraged by their physical education instructor, who they fondly called
“Coachie”, but they were unable to stand up to the more technical FSTC side,
who at the end of the day, won 30-15.

The FSTC male team were however not as fortunate as they were
beaten by the boys from Kings College 17-5.

Delight

Coach of the King’s College rugby team, John Silvanus Sire,
afterwards expressed his delight at his team’s performance. “I am so happy with
the performance of my boys,” he said, before adding: “we just started practice
this year and see how well they are catching up.”

On the part of the players from FSTC, they expressed dismay at
their loss, citing a change in tactics. According to Johnpaul Nwaya, a member
of the side, “We had already practiced with 10 players because we thought we
were going to play a 10-a-side rugby. When the formation changed it got us
confused.”

Although there was very little to cheer in boxing circles in
Nigeria during the outgoing year, the country has been promised a big boost
come next year by an international boxing promotion outfit, Louaa Boxing
Promotions.

Based in Egypt, LBP, who was recently granted a license to
promote fights in Nigeria, has swung into action with the first set of bouts
from the outfit’s stables fixed for February 12, 2011. Powered by former
heavyweight boxer, Richard Nwoba, a Nigerian based in Egypt, and Ralph Chidozie
George, a sports presenter as its West Africa representative, the organization
has promised boxing fans a swell time.

Already, six bouts have been scheduled for the debut promotion
in Nigeria. Confirmed competitions for the day are an Egyptian Cruiserweight
title fight involving two Egyptians, a UBO Africa title bout in the super
welterweight category, as well as a national heavyweight title bout amongst
other bouts yet to be announced.

Louaa Boxing, which has ‘Fighting is our Business’ as its motto,
has promoted fights in Turkey, Tanzania, Russia, Germany, Belarus and is the
major boxing promoter in Egypt where it has produced many tough pugilists
including Egypt’s most experienced professional boxer, Ramadan Yasser.

Federation support

While discussing with the secretary-general of the Nigeria
Boxing Board of Control, Remi Aboderin, Mr. Nwoba said he was advised to come
back home and revive the sport which has won several laurels for the country.

“Promoting in different countries, many friends and colleagues
asked me to return and help revive the sport in my country, and that’s why I
came to look around and I think we can do something here,” he said.

“It is sad that this great sport that brought Nigeria glory in
those days has been allowed to go down but all hope is not lost as Louaa is now
here and together with you, we will revive the sport and bring back the lost
glory,” he added.

On his own part, Aboderin promised to assist the new promoter to
succeed in the country.

“We will encourage you just like we will any other promoter who wants to
come back home to promote in the country,” he said.

Bayelsa State have emerged overall winners of this year’s
Governor Sylva National Wrestling Classics, which held in Yenagoa, the capital
city.

Bayelsa, which also won last year’s inaugural edition, emerged
winners in the Men’s and Women’s Freestyle events, as well as in the
Greco-Roman event. In the men’s event, Bayelsa finished tops with 86 points,
ahead of Delta State and Edeze Wrestling Club which finished with 47 and 35
points respectively. In the women’s event, the oil rich state swept the
opposition aside with a colossal haul of 91 points, well ahead of Imo State,
which came in second with 55 points, and Ondo State, which finished a point
less than Imo.

It was a much closer
contest however in the Greco-Roman event as Ondo State and Delta State tried to
make a contest out of it even though their efforts at the end proved incapable
of toppling the hosts who finished first with 70 points. Ondo and Delta
respectively got 58 and 52 points.

Outstanding wrestlers

Ondo, nevertheless, got recognition for producing the best
wrestler in the Women’s Freestyle event; Odunayo Adekuroye, who emerged
victorious in the 51 kilograms weight class where she defeated Bisola
Makanjuola of Akins Wrestling Club in the final. Adekuroye was one of Nigeria’s
medallists at this year’s Commonwealth Games which took place in New Delhi,
India.

In the Men’s Freestyle
event, Opukiri Agala, from Bayelsa State, was the most outstanding wrestler
after defeating all comers in the 74 kilograms weight class, including Famvie
Bekebo of the Ben John Wrestling Club; while Ifeanyi Ukwuagwu, representing
Abia State, emerged as the top wrestler in the Greco-Roman category. This
followed his dominance in the 84 kilograms category where he defeated Moses
Ojo, also of the Ben John Wrestling Club, in the final.

“It was a very good tournament,” said Daniel Igali, the national wrestling
coach. “A lot of very good wrestlers were in attendance and so many potential
champions have been unearthed. This is a step in the right direction and my
thanks goes to the governor of Bayelsa State for making all these possible.”