Sports
Sports Administrator Wants Children To Start Soccer Early
The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Yagazie Foundation, an NGO, Chinedu Ezirim, has appealed to parents to allow their children to start football from the age of five.
Ezirim, who made the appeal in an interview with newsmen last Monday in Lagos, said that if children were allowed to start football early, they would get it right.
“Most of our players start at very late age but with early preparation, I think we will get it right,” he said.
The sports administrator told Tidesports source that the Yagazie Foundation was established on January, 1, this year to help the youth and coaches to fight poverty and eradicate juvenile delinquency.
He added that the management of the NGO had been going to schools to tell them about sports and also encouraged them to pursue their education.
Ezirim said that the NGO had been reaching out to parents at the level of the Parents Teachers Association (PTA) to seek parental consent, adding that it was an important factor in football business.
He added that the NGO would have to monitor the performances of the talents after spotting them.
Contributing, Chief Executive Officer, Dominion Hotspurs FC, Lagos and a partner in Yagazie Foundation, Emmanuel Udeogu, said that football had age bracket, saying that the club normally nurtured young players.
“You cannot just be 30 years and say you want to play football.
“We take time to tell the parents to allow their children to start football at an early age.
“Some children will first go to universities and come back to play football. In the course of returning to football, they falsify their age.
“Parents should allow their children to start football early,” Udeogu said.
The club’s proprietor explained that any child interested in football should start from a young team of a big club as done in Europe, adding that this would help to make such a child a star in the future.
Udeogu said that this would serve as a very good platform for the child to grow.
“In football circle, one year is very big. If a player does well, it will lift the player up like somebody who has been in the system for 15 years”, he noted.
A well-known football pundit in the State, Chief Christopher Okonkwo has lauded the efforts and vision of the Super Eagles Coach Eric Chelle for going from one venue of the Nigeria Domestic Nigeria Professional Football League match to the other in monitoring Nigerian players, with a view to invite some exceptional good one discovered into the main stream of the Super Eagles team.
Okonkwo, who made the commendation in an interview at the Port Harcourt Club recently, described the positive move by Coach Chelle as a good step in the right direction, noting that the practice was how its been done in the past among any contracted coach assigned to tinker the Super Eagles team.
“Truly, it has been an old tradition in the country seeing any newly engaged Coach to lead the National team, visiting some our Nigeria League venues during the league matches to spot light some good talents that could be used to beef up some grey areas in the department of Eagles team”
He, however, frowned at the current situation where our coaches had continously been over depending on the use of foreign based players during invitation of players to the National camp, thereby, relegating the domestic home based league players to the background as if they have nothing much to offer to the team.
“I can vividly recall that the likes of great players in the mode of Finidi George, Taribo West, Kanu Nwankwo, Austin Okocha, Richard Owobokiri, Emmanuel Osuigwe among others started from Nigeria football league before they graduated to play in Europe through which they later invited to Super Eagles camp to represent Nigeria”
“Besides, I’m also of the view that going to secondary school football competitive games could equally serves as a a good platform to discover budding talents that could be nurtured to become great stars in near future”, Okonkwo frankly added.
Okonkwo, therefore, prayed that any football coach to be engaged by the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) to tinker the Super Eagles should be told not to confine himself in staying in big hotel alone but to be visiting some of our local league match venues, with a view to discover some good players that can be drafted into the Super Eagles team.
“Indeed, I stand to be challenged that there some young good players in the Nigeria Professional League. If spotted and exposed, could give the some of the invited foreign based players a stiff competitive fight in securing a postion in the team”, Okonkwo emphatically stated.
Ezechukwu, one of the youngest members of the Nigerian contingent at the championship in Ghana, said her ambition was to win the 100m title in style and cap it with a new personal record.
The fresh secondary school graduate explained that she is fully focused on contributing to Team Nigeria’s medal hopes and is determined to deliver strong performances across her events.
“My main objective in Ghana is to clinch the 100m title and the 4×100m,” Ezechukwu told Tidesports source.
“Nigeria can be assured of my very best and my commitment to the Team. I would love to set a new personal best in Ghana, but anything that comes, I will take it. The spirit in the team is high, and I think we are ready to go,” she said.
Ezechukwu, who was part of Nigeria’s women’s 4x100m relay squad at the World Relays in Botswana, said the experience gained from that competition has strengthened her mindset heading into the continental championships.
She admitted that she learned valuable lessons from her previous outing, including a difficult moment during the relay where an early error affected the team’s rhythm, but said she has used the experience to improve her discipline and composure.
“The secret is just being disciplined, training hard and trusting my coach and believing in God, and the result will show,” she added.
The teenager is part of a 41-member Nigerian team comprising 24 female and 17 male athletes competing at the championships, which begin today at the University of Ghana, Legon.
Nigeria are expected to compete across multiple track and field events as they aim for a strong finish against the continent’s elite athletes.
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