The January transfer window opens in 32 days with big money expected to be splashed on players who have excelled since the new European season began in August. I’m excited that a Nigerian is the beautiful bride of European teams. Many club managers are thinking of offering Victor Moses long term contracts in the summer. Moses has earned three Man-of-the-Match diadems, playing for Chelsea at the right wing-back position, a place designed for the Nigerian by his Italian manager Antonio Conte.
What it simply means, if Moses doesn’t understand, is that the position is his for as long as Conte remains Chelsea’s manager. I also know that Moses understands that Chelsea’s owner is notorious for sacking managers who don’t meet his expectation. It follows, therefore, that Moses should not be cajoled into extending his contract based on his form. Rather he should follow his mind and head for Barcelona next year.
Chelsea would recruit massively in the summer, if it returns to the UEFA Champions Leagues. This means that Moses’ shirt isn’t guaranteed, even if Conte remains on board. I also don’t think that Moses will enjoy regular appearances with Chelsea now that Ivanovic is being introduced as his substitute. The right wing-back position isn’t Moses’ rightful position. My hunch tells me that Ivanovic may soon bench Moses, given the fact that it is his position. Besides, he is bigger and stronger, but not as skilful as the Nigerian.
I would advise Moses to head straight to Barcelona next year. In Barca, Moses will be able to express himself properly since much of the Spanish side is an embodiment of very skilful players with incredible team understanding. Besides, Barcelona’s manager Enrique will be playing Moses regularly since he is the one recruiting the Nigerian. In Chelsea Conte could be fired mid-season next year, if things go awry.
Moses should use the remaining part of this season to master playing at the right wingback position. A vacancy exists already in that position at Barcelona, which he could easily grab, no matter who is recruited in January to man it till the end of the season. Besides, Barca is a more stable club for skilful players, such as Moses, not Chelsea without a traditional style. Barca’s tikitaka (passing game) is legendary.
The English press has been unfair in analysing Moses’ form. Many Chelsea fans are wondering why the Nigerian’s talent couldn’t be recognised by Jose Mourinho. They have argued that Mourinho couldn’t bring out the best in Moses to command a regular shirt largely because the Portuguese likes playing big, strong and tall players with grit than smallish men with sublime skills such as Moses and Mata, even now that the Spaniard plays for Manchester United.
A few pundits in Moruinho’s defence argued that Moses was in Liverpool, Stoke and indeed West Ham and didn’t play as well as he is doing at Chelsea under Conte. But the truth remains that Moses cannot force himself onto the pitch if the coaches feel otherwise. Conte has shown that Moses is a versatile player. He needs to play for a formidable team that relies on playing as a unit than on one player’s yeoman effort.
It is for this reason that Moses should consider the Barcelona option, given the array of stars in the Spanish side and their pedigree in Europe. Barca is a constant fixture in big European competitions, winning trophies with aplomb.
Wednesday’s award as the best player in the Barclays English Premier League matches for November further enhances the need for Moses to accept the Barcelona option, which offers him better challenges.
Indeed, it has been quite a while since a Nigerian was voted the African Footballer of the Year. I feel strongly that Moses would thrill the world from September 2017, if he signs for Barcelona in the summer. Barca is always in the news. They may be tottering now, largely because Lionel Messi is injured. But the bigger picture is that Moses’ inclusion in the team would reduce the burden on the Argentine. Moses’ inclusion would give Barca the balance on the right flank that they lost when Dani Alves dumped them this season for Juventus.
I tip Moses to be the African Footballer of the Year 2017, if he makes the move to Spain. This doesn’t mean if he remains at Chelsea he wouldn’t be crowned. The truth is that as a new recruit, Moses would be played since there is a vacuum in that position, which means he would command a regular team shirt. I don’t think it would be the same for Moses with the Blues.
National Sports
Festival dead!
In other climes, sport is business, providing jobs for millions of people. Aside the athletes who get employed, supporting staff, such as doctors, nurses, coaches, bus drivers, cleaners, dieticians etc whose roles keep the athletes in competitive mode, smile to the bank either weekly or monthly depending on the payment structure.
The ripple effect of the aggregate functions of these personnel attracts the media and the blue chip companies which indentify their goods and services with the athletes’ sports programmes for better performances. Indeed, there is hardly any sport that isn’t a money-spinner because of the passion of those who follow the game. Lovers of specific sport keep the calendar of activities of such a game because they either want to watch it live on television or listen to commentaries on radio or head for the competition venue to satisfy their passion.
Today, some of the richest people in the world are sportsmen and women, who serve as icons for the younger generation to emulate. Not so for Nigeria, largely because those who head the sector are clueless about the system. They create controversies to delude those who put them there that they are working. The reality dawns on them when they are sacked.
One was therefore not shocked when athletes invaded the moribund National Stadium, Surulere, Lagos on Wednesday, protesting the absence of the hitherto biannual National Sports Festival, which is meant to discover, nurture and expose budding stars in the 774 Local Government Areas in the country.
Who won’t do so if that is the only way to make ends meet? People identify with certain disciplines to emulate others. So, when sportsmen and women are denied the platform to exhibit their skills, it is only wise that they protest to attract the attention of the appropriate authorities. How would people train daily, yet they cannot compete? Whose duty is it to organise the National Sports Festival? What is the APC’s sports policy? Does it include creating the environment for sports to thrive? Or does the APC government see sports as just participating in international tournaments? If yes, how do the athletes prepare? Is the APC government with this idea of recruiting Nigeria- born overseas-based kids to represent us? Does the government not know that providing the enabling environment for sports will make the citizenry stay healthy? Is recreation not part of sports?
In the past, the talents in the 774 local governments looked forward to the National Sports Festival because it afforded them the opportunity of visiting Lagos, Nigeria’s former capital which is also its business and financial engine-room. Many athletes looked forward to seeing bridges, high-rise buildings and the hustle and bustle of the Centre of Excellence, which was the official venue for the multi-sports tournament.
Today, many talents dissipate their energy on social vices in the villages simply because the culture of organising sports competitions is dead in most of the 774 local governments. Those who organise sports tournaments do so when “one son of the soil” wants to celebrate his or her feats or remembers his or her loved ones. Such sporting competitions are not enduring. Anytime the sponsor is broke or is sacked from government, the competition dies.
As for the state governors, they only remember sports when it is time to pick their commissioners, who most times don’t have the wherewithal to drive the industry to achieve its full potential. Not forgetting the in-fighting between the commissioners for sports and their sports councils or is it commissions in the disbursement of cash.
The school system which used to be the hub for producing sportsmen and women is dead. Spaces which were hitherto used as playgrounds have been built up as classrooms, such that the few schools that bothered to organise sporting events hire stadia for their competitions. How did the students prepare for the events? Nigeria, we hail thee.
The states’ ministries of education don’t have functional sports units which should provide the data base for fishing out talents. In fact, most state sports commissioners treat the sports arm of the Ministry of Education with levity. Let us not remind ourselves of the personality clashes between the two bodies’ commissioners. Little wonder the high incident of age cheating because the requisite data isn’t sought from the Ministry of Education. The simple effect is that sport is dead in the states, except in places where the governor likes or plays particular sports. Such a sport becomes the basis of supporting the game- a one-off affair.
But how can the National Sports Festival hold when there are no Teachers Training Colleges to groom good games masters and mistresses, who would be sent to the schools to develop the talents?
Until Sports Ministry chieftains accept the fact that it is their responsibility to organise the National Sports Festival, the multi-sports competition will – God forbid – die. Sports ministers have ceded this responsibility to governors, who use it to score cheap political points to the detriment of the competition. It is rather strange that the sports ministry chiefs didn’t think of getting big firms to buy into the sponsorship of the festival because of its popularity. If they did, we won’t be talking about the absence of such a competition in the last four years.
In fact, the National Sports Festival lost its significance when it was moved away from its permanent venue, the National Stadium Surulere. The rules changed, depending on what the host wanted. Key sports were cancelled if the host could not build the facilities. Poaching of renowned athletes to the host states became the norm as part of the strategy to win the games at all cost.
Can the sports minister tell Nigerians when the next National Sports Festival will hold and where? Hello, is Solomon Dalung reading this?
