Sports
Nigeria Not Serious To Succeed In Sports – Igali
Following Team Nigeria’s poor outing at the recently concluded 2024 Olympic Games in Paris. France, former President of the Athletics Federation of Nigeria, (AFN), Mr. Dan Ngerem urged the Federal Government to overhaul sports administration and called for a sound management of athletes.
Adding voice to Mr. Ngerem’s lamentation on the decline in Nigeria’s sports is Dr. Daniel Igali, current President of the country’s Wrestling Federation and an Olympic gold medallist.
Speaking on Team Nigeria’s outing at the Paris Games in a no-holds-barred interview with a Lagos-based radio stations. Dr. Igali declared that Nigeria “is not ready to succeed in sports, we are just talking”.
Excerpts:
“I expected we would be probably able to get a podium performance but it wasn’t to be. As the President of the wrestling federation, I also want to tender my apology to the Nigerian nation, because the expectations were high, not because we had that much investment in wrestling but because we had programmed our athletes for about 10 years and expected one or two of them to get a medal.
He said that the federation presidents, secretaries and technical directors had a meeting with the Sports Minister and the Permanent Secretary some months before the Olympics about their preparations which dove-tailed into projections for medals.
“A lot of the Presidents made promises of winning one or two medals, the projections were about five or six medals from Team Nigeria at that meeting.
However, when I spoke, I was quite factual with the Minister, I made him understand that projections are done scientifically, based on your past two World Championships, because the World Championship is the closest thing to the Olympics. So if you have three world champions, you can say well, give or take, you expect two of them to come back as gold medallists. Or you may have silver medallists and you expect them to upgrade to gold. So I asked them, how many gold medallists did we have in all the sports. We had only one bronze in wrestling from Odunayo Adekuroye and that was what we were going into the Olympics with. So when I heard people (the Sports Minister, Senator John Enoh) say we were going to do better than Atlanta 1996, I asked from where?
Igali stressed that “I understand that we are a country that wants to win badly, we are optimists but let the optimism be based on reality”.
Asked what he thinks is the way forward, the Bayelsa State Sports Commissioner said, “I just hope the President (Bola Tinubu) will now look deep into sports, offer even 50per cent of the funds required for sports, because right now, the funding from government is about 5per cent of what sports require. Maybe President Tinubu should do convene a National Conference on sports development where we will all sit down and thinker with what we think we can do to get sports back on the right path towards the 2028 Olympics but really for 2032”.
Asked on the way forward out of the gloom, the Bayelsa-born sports administrator said that government is not funding sports development but competitions.
“What has been happening is that government doesn’t fund activities of the federations. There is no way you can make commensurate success or progression in sports if you don’t fund federations. I have been a Federation President for about 12 years now and I have not received 10 kobo for the internal programmes of the wrestling federation. Programmes for U-13, U-15, U-17, U-20 and the senior teams which are most times A and B. And we don’t have any. What Nigeria does now is to fund Games like the African Games, Commonwealth Games and the Olympic Games. Everybody wants to be at the Games because there is a lot of estacodes to earn”.
He stressed that what athletes and the federations need are other competitions like the Grand Prix in places like Egypt and Paris where athletes can actually be developed.
“There is no way you can go to the Olympics with your top who competes once a year and expect the athlete to defeat his counterparts from other countries who may have had 30 matches in one year.
When I was in the national team of Nigeria before I went to Canada, the total number of matches I had from 1990 to 1994 was 27 matches as a national athlete.
I went to Canada and in 1995, alone, I had 47 matches, in 1996, I had 52 matches and in 1997, I had 73 matches. In 1998, I was now in the national team and I came back to 54 matches. Then in 1999, I was now a world champion, so I didn’t have to go above 50 matches.
As a college(university) student, I was competing in about 15 tournaments, I was competing almost every weekend. That is where you begin to hone your skills and when you get to the mat, you are not scared of who is there. That is what our athletes need and it is expensive. If we really want to do sports, it is very expensive.
Still, on funding, Igali said he is disappointed with the private sector in Nigeria because of their lack of support for sports and athletes.
“One of our biggest problems in Nigeria is the private sector. They just don’t give a hoot about sports. Blessing Oborududu won the first Olympic silver medal in the history of wrestling and the highest medal in the Tokyo Olympics, do you know how much she got from the private sector? Zero Naira. Not one penny was given to her. It was only the Bayelsa State government that gave her N4million.
This was the same athlete who went back again to Paris with a fracture on her femur to compete. And we are talking about our athletes doing well at a major Games.
Igali disclosed that as a national champion in Canada, he got thousands of dollars from different private companies and sponsors from 1998 till 2000 when he won the Olympic gold.
“And we want to succeed in sports? We are not ready to succeed, we are just talking. I tell you this. after two weeks, this talk about our poor outing in Paris will die down and it’s going to be business as usual. We will go back to funding the African Games, Commonwealth Games and Olympic Games and get ready two weeks to each.
If we really want to fund sports, let us get ready and fund sports. We promised gold medallists in the Paris Olympics $5,000, meanwhile, Morocco promised $346,000 for the same gold and Ecuador had $150,000. We are not a serious country.
He also talked about the release of the paltry funds the government gives to sports which he said though he appreciates but regrets it comes very late almost always.
“Australia, Canada and the United Kingdom, serious countries as I am talking now, have already approved and released hundreds of millions of dollars for 2025 and 2026. If we are going to be serious with sports, we cannot look at it as the normal budgetary cycle, it must be multi-year cycle. What was due for this Olympics (2024) should have been released last year or a year before.
On the duty of the federations and the presidents, he said it is not their responsibility to look for funding for their activities, stressing that the large chunk of funding is the responsibility of the government.
“The truth of the matter is that it is Nigeria that is going to the Olympics and the government should do a chunk of the funding, even support can come from other sectors, the real responsibility is for the government.
The duty of the federations presidents is to get the right people to man the different areas that will provide support to your athletes, coaches and the right education for their administrators.
Talking about wrestling, we ought to have nine national teams, because at the cadet level, we have Greco-Roman, freestyle and female teams. You have the same for the junior and senior teams. So we should have at least nine national coaches, and nine national assistant coaches.
And we should have programmes for each of the cadres of national teams. The coaches should visit schools and recruit the right athletes. This is what is happening in other serious countries like Iran. Russia and the US. That is why sports is very expensive. The US budget for wrestling this year alone (2024) is $60m. What is the budget for Nigeria’s wrestling?
I want our athletes to win because I know we’ve done the barest minimum. Because of the resilience of our athletes, we have gotten to the point where there was an opportunity for us to clinch one or two medals.
So I’m disappointed and we have had that conversation among ourselves. Some of the athletes said they were expecting to do more and have apologised that they were not able to do that.
And I pity the Sports Minister. Some people are even calling for his head. A man that came a few months ago for an Olympics? And how much was released to him and when?
In conclusion, Igali lambasted the government for treating football above other sports and wondered which serious sporting country does that.
“We have turned Nigeria into two classes of athletes – footballers are the number one athletes and everybody else is second class. Football goes to AFCON, it comes back with a silver medal. What do we do for them, they shake the President’s hand, give them plots of land, give them houses, give them national honours.
A month after, our athletes go for the African Games (an equivalent of the AFCON), many of them, over 40 win gold medals, did they have any handshake? Were they promised National Honours? Did they get any plot of land in Abuja? Did they get any houses? What kind of a country are we?
Interview monitored from Port Harcourt.
Nigerian football fans and former internationals may have finally joined the call on President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to save Nigerian football from the grip of the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF), demanding a complete overhaul and the resignation of the board following a series of national-team heartbreaks, including the Super Eagles’ failure to qualify for the 2026 FIFA World Cup, their second consecutive absence and the Super Falcons’ recent loss of an automatic qualification spot for the 2027 FIFA Women’s World Cup in Brazil.
Until now, football legend Segun Odegbami has been a lone voice in the vanguard of those calling on the Ibrahim Gusau-led NFF board to step aside. However, many ex-internationals, angered that the national embarrassment has now spilled over to the women’s team, have joined the call to “save our football.”
“We are demanding a total systemic clear-out and consequences at every tier of Nigerian football,” one of the former players said yesterday, pleading to remain anonymous to avoid “arrows” from what he described as desperate officials holding Nigerian football by the jugular.
Ahead of the September 27, 2026 elective congress of the NFF, scheduled to hold in Lafia, Nasarawa State, Chairman of the Advocacy for Nigeria Football Reforms Initiative, Prince Harrison Jalla, has also painted a gloomy picture of the future of Nigerian football.
Jalla’s position is in tandem with that of some aspirants who are also crying blue murder, alleging that the electoral procedure is skewed in favour of incumbent NFF President Ibrahim Musa Gusau to secure a smooth passage to a second term unopposed.
Jalla insisted that “all indicators are pointing to a gloomy picture for the future of Nigerian football, mainly due to administrative ineptitude, while the gladiators remain engrossed and fixated on the election.”
“The major crux of the election is the guidelines, which make it very difficult for other candidates to secure endorsements from across the six geopolitical zones to challenge Gusau.
“The NFF elective congress creates a skewed voting structure because [certain blocs] hold an overwhelming majority of the voting power, which critics argue marginalises key football stakeholders such as club owners, players, coaches, referees and sports writers.
“Out of the total delegates and voting structure, the 37 State FA chairmen form the primary voting bloc, making it difficult for independent candidates to win.
“This is so because of the marriage between the FA chairmen and the NFF. Most FA chairmen depend solely on the Federation for favours. Over time, during national and international engagements, the NFF uses such opportunities to reward the FA chairmen with trips and estacodes.
“They have been so compromised that no Jupiter would make them see reasons for a change. The system, therefore, heavily favours the incumbent leadership seeking re-election. That explains why they were in a hurry to pass a vote of confidence in the NFF leadership even when Nigerian football became topsy-turvy.
“As desperation has beclouded their reasoning, they have forgotten how low they have dragged Nigerian football.”
A cursory look at the catalogue of failures by Nigeria’s national teams will reveal this;
Super Eagles (Senior Men): Failed to qualify for the 2026 FIFA World Cup. Their campaign ended in agonising fashion in November 2025 during the CAF playoff final, when they lost 4–3 on penalties to DR Congo. This marked the second consecutive World Cup missed by the senior national team. Earlier, in January 2026, they were also eliminated from the 2025 AFCON via a penalty shootout.
Super Falcons (Senior Women): Suffered an early continental exit by losing 1–0 to Cameroon in the 2026 WAFCON quarter-finals. The defeat stripped them of an automatic ticket to the 2027 FIFA Women’s World Cup in Brazil, forcing them into an inter-confederation playoff route. Worse still, Banyana Banyana of South Africa stopped the Super Falcons with a 2-1 defeat in Morocco, marking Nigeria’s worst outing in the history of WAFCON.
Golden Eaglets (Men’s U-17): Failed to qualify for the U-17 AFCON and subsequently missed out on three consecutive FIFA U-17 World Cups — 2023, 2025 and 2026.
Flying Eagles (Men’s U-20): Missed both the 2026 U-20 AFCON and the FIFA U-20 World Cup.
Olympic Team (Men’s U-23): Failed to qualify for the 2023 U-23 AFCON, which directly resulted in their failure to qualify for the 2024 Paris Olympic Games.
An official NFF apology to the government and Nigerians was met with backlash, with fans dismissing it as “too little, too late” and “one apology too many”, while demanding actual resignations.
The current frustration among fans stems from what they regard as an unprecedented catalogue of systemic failures across all tiers of Nigeria’s national teams.
Segun Odegbami said the failures had become one too many.
“If you fail to take your team to the World Cup, you find out that more often than not, they vote you out or sack you.
“That’s the measure. If you have a coach who doesn’t do well, they sack him. If you have a player who is doing badly, you remove him.”
“These guys have not succeeded. They’re our friends; that’s the painful thing. We know ourselves. We are all in the business and, when we champion the fact that they should go, they make you an enemy.
“It’s not a personalised thing. They have failed and, if we go back to that route, we are going to fail as we have failed before,” he said.
The financial damage from missing recent major tournaments is equally devastating, with total losses estimated at between ?150 billion and ?300 billion in direct payouts and broader economic partnerships.
This continuous string of qualification failures has effectively choked off the federation’s primary revenue pipelines and left its local development initiatives starved of funds.
The economic wreckage breaks down across several critical areas. By failing to reach the expanded World Cup, the NFF forfeited a guaranteed baseline participation fee of $10.5 million, reportedly worth roughly ?15.5 billion.
This single tournament loss wiped out an amount equivalent to roughly 87 per cent of the NFF’s projected annual operational budget. Had the Super Eagles advanced beyond the group stage, the rewards would have risen above $12 million, while reaching the quarter-finals could have yielded up to $20 million in performance-related payments.
Early exits by the Super Falcons and the qualification failures of the youth teams, U-17, U-20 and U-23, mean the NFF has also missed out on vital developmental subsidies and travel grants normally provided by continental governing bodies.
Corporate organisations and major sports betting companies are scaling back their sponsorship valuations. Without global television exposure, the NFF cannot command premium rates for brand placement.
The federation also misses out on potential revenue from global jersey sales, training gear and licensed supporter memorabilia that normally spike around major tournaments.
By missing out on tournament participation, Nigeria also loses leverage to draw heavily from FIFA’s financial programmes aimed at upgrading domestic training academies and pitches.
Consecutive missed World Cups have further lowered the market value of the national team brand, making future broadcast and marketing rights significantly harder to sell at a premium.
Former Ajax midfielder Hedwiges Maduro has praised Nigerian striker Tolu Arokodare, highlighting the forward’s strength and power and suggesting that he could prove valuable to Ajax in the Eredivisie.
Arokodare joined Ajax from Wolverhampton Wanderers on a season-long loan in July, with the Dutch club holding an option to make the move permanent.
He has already made an impact for his new side, providing an assist in Ajax’s 2-0 victory over PEC Zwolle in their opening Eredivisie fixture.
Maduro discussed Arokodare’s qualities during an appearance on ESPN’s Voetbalpraat, where he assessed how the Nigerian could complement Ajax’s attacking options.
He sees Arokodare as offering a different profile to Marcos Leonardo, particularly against opponents who defend deep and limit the space available for attacking runs.
Speaking about the Nigerian striker, Maduro highlighted his physical qualities and explained why he believes they could make him a valuable option for Ajax in the Dutch top flight.
“I think Tolu has something special, in terms of strength and power. I think he can be of real value in the Eredivisie,” Maduro said, as quoted by Ajax Showtime.
According to Maduro, the tactical demands of certain matches could make Arokodare’s physical presence an important option for Ajax, especially when opponents retreat towards their own penalty area.
He contrasted the situation with Leonardo, who he believes benefits from having space to make attacking runs. Maduro explained that when teams defend deep, those spaces become more difficult to find.
“Leonardo needs space. If teams drop back completely, where are you going to make those runs?
Then you get more use out of Tolu as a focal point to drop the ball,” he added.
The Chairman of the Local Organizing Committee, LOC, of the Arsenal Nigeria Converge 2026, Ugochukwu Oputa, has said that over 25 states across Nigeria were involved in the second edition of the Arsenal Converge scheduled for Port Harcourt from August 14 to 16, 2026.
Oputa disclosed this on Sunday after the Converge meeting at the Ediz Wine Bar in Port Harcourt, Rivers State.
According to him, Arsenal’s popularity cuts across the nation, and the Converge is organized to provide a period for supporters to network, interact, and harmonize.
“Knowing how Arsenal’s popularity is spread across the nation, it became necessary that all the different supporters of Arsenal club across the country harmonize and create a particular period where we can meet, network and interact,” Oputa said.
He outlined the five-day schedule of activities to include
Press conference,
Environmental sanitation and community service at Mile 1 Market, Diobu, involving both visitors and residents, arrival, welcome and cocktail party. Others included Games Day, football competition and other fun activities at the Rivers State University football pitch, Community Shield watch party yesterday, where all Arsenal supporters’ groups met, interacted, and discussed the future of Arsenal, including plans for the 2027 hosting rights of the Converge.
Oputa added that this year’s Converge which was in Port Harcourt, had over 3,000 fans registered.
“Port Harcourt Arsenal Community is a recognized supporters’ club of Arsenal in London and we have over 25 states that participated in the Arsenal Nigeria Converge 2026,” he said.
Also speaking, a member of the Nigeria Arsenal Supporters Working Committee, Nsikak Ntia, said that what distinguishes Arsenal supporters is their offline community impact.
“What we are doing here in Port Harcourt is beyond football. It’s a family that is growing. We had over 3,000 to 4,000 people on Saturday at the Rivers State University that shared the confidence that Arsenal represents,” Ntia said.
He noted that the club’s motto, ‘Victoria Concordia Crescit’ – ‘Victory Through Harmony’ – is the bedrock of the group.
“The work that we do at Mile 1 Market is to help with environmental protection and increase what we do in society.
“We also have future plans to promote environmental protection and better ways to handle waste.
“These are things that are germane for our future, the future of our young people and generations unborn.
” It goes beyond football, it goes beyond banter, it goes beyond yapping at each other.
“That is what Arsenal Football Club is all about. Arsenal has the most well-organized supporters’ club in Nigeria and Africa’ he sated.
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