By Fred Edoreh
Thank God, the COVID-19 pandemic is rapidly giving way for the return of sports teams to international action. For Nigeria, despite the added challenges of managing international engagements now, and unlike many other African nations, the national football teams have been highly globally visible in the post-lockdown era.
The secure camp in Austria guarantees getting the players together. From there, the Super Falcons proceeded to open the 2021 campaigns in February with their participation in the Turkish Women’s Cup which they won, defeating CSKA Moscow and Uzbekistan 1-0 each before pounding Equatorial Guinea 9-0.
From Turkey, the team moved into the US Summer Series, engaging Jamaica, Portugal and the United States, easily the most influential in the globe. Even in their 2-0 loss to the US national team, President of the US Football Federation, Cindy Parlow Cone, could not but hail their strength and expectation for them to possibly win the Women’s World Cup in the not too distant feature, if kept well.
Retaining their pole position in FIFA ranking in the African continent, the Super Falcons are indeed in the eyes of the world. Every top team wants to engage them and the Canada Football Federation has them listed for another invitational in Baltimore in a few weeks.
The men’s team have also had their outings. Opening the year with the Nations Cup qualifiers against Benin Republic and Lesotho and qualifying with a match to spare, the NFF leadership immediately moved focus to preparing them for the World Cup qualifiers with the arrangement of a two-legged friendly against Cameroon in Austria which provided the coaching crew the opportunity of trying out new players.
The next call was to Los Angeles, California, against the Mexican national team, and the NFF utilised the opportunity towards the building of the CHAN team with home based players from the Nigeria Professional Football League.
While these engagements have been without any government funding support, their technical value is towards strengthening the national teams, with the Qatar 2022 World Cup qualifiers and the Cameroon 2022 AFCON right before the Super Eagles while the Falcons are up for the forthcoming Africa Women Championship and the next FIFA Women World Cup qualifiers.
Even more valuable is that the global visibility of the national teams provides a refreshing attention on Nigeria, away from the projections of the negatives of Boko Haram, criminal herdsmen menace, banditry, kidnapping and secessionist agitations that have tended to define Nigeria in recent times.
It was thus interesting to see President Amaju Pinnick among a carefully selected few world leaders as special guest of UEFA at the Euro Nations Cup finals. Trust Amaju, he seized the opportunity to personally put head with British Prime Minister Boris Johnson on relations with Nigerian sports, business and economy.
On August 25, he would also be special guest of the CONCACAF President, Victor Montagliani, at the CONCACAF MLS All Stars versus Liga MX in Los Angeles. The intense competition between the United States and Mexico is a hub for top global sports brands and businessmen, and Pinnick can be trusted to draw value from the platform not only to bear on Nigerian football but to also project the nation’s economic and diplomatic interests.
Though the only FIFA Council member not issued a diplomatic passport by his country, Pinnick understands his mission for Nigeria beyond just the fun of football.
Earlier in July when the Super Eagles were converging in Los Angeles for the Mexico friendly, he called at the State of Maryland to negotiate very important cooperations for Nigeria.
Received by Lieutenant Governor Boyd Rutherford whom he immediately enlisted as a fan of Nigerian football, and with Washington DC, just next door, looking on, he came off with agreements for the Super Eagles and Super Falcons to hold at least one friendly match a year in Baltimore, the state’s largest city with equally one of the biggest ports in the United States; leveraging on the Baltimore-Maryland 2026 platform/assets to create added value for NFF sponsors for broader activations; exchange on youth development programmes; the development of a formal sister-city relations to cover football development and stadium management and; most strikingly, the utilization of the platform to create a symbiotic economic relationship in broader areas of economic development between Maryland and Nigeria.
But it is not only about taking Nigeria to the world. The Pinnick leadership is already perfecting plans to bring the world to Nigeria.
Soon, the Aisha Buhari International Invitational Tournament would kick off in Lagos with selected top women football nations in participation.
Besides the fun and the value for the preparation of the Super Falcons, the event would elicit world attention on Nigeria and attract international sports brands and sports businessmen to Nigeria.
With his huge resourcefulness, high level international contacts, outstanding marketing savvy, great organisationak skill, excellent inter-personal and institutional relations and humility even in the face of challenges, Pinnick has been in the forefront of re-defining the political leadership and governance policies of African and world football, and it is expected that FIFA President, Gianni Infantino, would be at the tournament in solidarity with Nigeria and for the good of the game.
Also expected is CAF President, Patrice Motsepe, Pinnick’s dependable ally, also President of Mamelodi Sundowns, brother-in-law of South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa and a Forbes-listed entrepreneur renowned for his African Rainbow Minerals and his holdings in Harmony Gold, one of the world’s largest gold miners.
The event is thus not only for football but as well for the diplomatic projection of the nation, and it is fitting that it is named in honour of Aisha Buhari, easily Nigeria’s most loved First Lady for her passion for the people and her graceful dispositions.