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Protests in the
Arab world have toppled a President and forced one to back-track, and
declare that he will step down later in the year.

The opium of
successful protests has spread into other countries to give modern-day
credence to the adage about the “voice of the people” being the voice
of reason. Ironically, obedience to the people’s voice started in
Nigeria sometime last year.

No! We didn’t have
any protests on the streets and of course no President was toppled but
the people spoke, a major government in Nigeria listened and acted to
appoint Samson Siasia as Head Coach of the national team, the Super
Eagles.

He has the onerous
task of reviving the team and Nigerians’ expectations to at least
returning us to the top echelon of football in Africa; no mean task
considering the depths to which we have fallen recently. The good thing
is that Siasia’s track record speaks volumes. In addition to a
successful career as a player, he has led Nigeria’s U-20 team to a
continental title and Junior World Cup final plus taking the U-23 team
to an Olympic final, where they lost narrowly to a Lionel
Messi-inspired Argentina. It only made good sense to appoint him to
nurture and mould the talents he has ‘discovered’ into the Eagles
future and hope for silverware we have not won at senior level for
almost two decades. That means he must know what to do.

Getting it right

Siasia has since
clearly demonstrated that he knows the way forward for Nigerian
football by setting up SIA-ONE Soccer Academy. In a nutshell, the
conveyor belt of Nigerian talent must be discovered, given the proper
foundation and properly nurture them to be the future Eagles.

Therefore, it was a
historical moment for COD United to host Coach Siasia over the weekend
of January 30 and welcome him to launch one of contributions to Youth
Development. COD United is a football club that was created from City
of David, a parish of Redeemed Christian Church of God in keeping with
the tradition of English Premiership clubs like Liverpool, Aston Villa,
Bolton, Manchester City, Aston Villa, Bolton Wanderers, Birmingham
City, Southampton and Tottenham Hotspur who all started from the church.

COD United is
currently a National Amateur Division 1 club, and started from Division
3 in 2007. The club strives to maintain its core elements of
discipline, integrity, excellence and team-work in all ramifications.
The club has been involved in community development since inception
through its players and recently contributed football kits and balls to
Baptist Boys High School, Victoria Island, in addition to redeveloping
the school’s pitch.

A partnership that works

COD United has now
entered into a partnership with the Eagles coach and SIA-ONE Academy to
launch a new initiative in the Oniru Community Cup; a 5-aside
competition for the youth living and playing football in the community
in Victoria Island.

The inaugural
competition will be held by the end of the first quarter and will be an
annual event. The trophy for the competition was unveiled by the Eagles
coach, representatives of the Oniru family and COD United to the
delight of around 200 excited youngsters from the community. The coach
also signed numerous autographs and posed for pictures with fans after
addressing the City of David congregation who prayed for him as he
starts on his journey as national team coach.

COD United and
Siasia also intend to partner on youth development through mutual
technical support on some outlined terms such as scouting and
recommendation of talent as well as nurturing grounds. In truth, these
kinds of partnerships should be replicated all over the nation as an
ad-hoc arrangement that could work efficiently to fill the gap created
by the absence of a structured and organised scouting system so that
talents are not wasted.

After all is said and done, it is time for us all to join hands
together in support of the “people’s coach” who humbly admits that it
was the people’s desires that got him the job in the first place
starting from the friendly against Sierra-Leone in Lagos and all
through his tenure.