Author: Mayowa Kufile
“Any moment from now, I am sure they would be announcing a coach, an enterprising coach at that.” Former president of the Nigeria Football Federation, Amaju Melvin Pinnick, made the above statement during a television interview on Channels TV on the 3rd of January, 2025. The statement pertained to who the next coach of the Super Eagles of Nigeria would be; many would have expected a young, highly rated, and one of the new apostles of modern football. Four days after that statement, the NFF announced Eric Sekou Chelle as the new coach of the Super Eagles. He was tasked…
The 2025 Africa Cup of Nations enters its business end of the tournament when eight nations battle for four tickets into the semi-final, and not since the expansion of this competition from 16 to 24 countries has the quarter-finalist been more revered and iconic like this. This is the 35th edition of the AFCON, and seven of the eight countries in this quarter-finals have won the competition 22 times (Egypt 7, Cameroun 5, Nigeria 3, Ivory Coast 3, Algeria 2, Morocco 1, Senegal 1), with Mali, the only country left without an AFCON trophy. This number represents that, in the…
For the first time in the league this season, we have a matchday that all twenty teams in the league will feature, and what an interesting week NPFL MD4 Matchday four was with some interesting results, post-match brouhaha, friends battles, and some brotherly affairs witnessed in some centers. Here, I look at five things I observed during this weekend’s NPFL actions. NPFL MD4: BABY OF THE LEAGUE GETTING “AMBUSHED”. What a baptism of fire it has been for Ikorodu City’s first-ever campaign in the Nigeria topflight. The Oga Boys are still waiting for the first win after losing another home…
It’s another match week in the Nigeria Premier Football League (NPFL MD2) as we witnessed seven matches on Saturday and Sunday respectively with games involving Rangers International and Enyimba unable to hold because of continental engagements while the flood in Maiduguri means El-Kanemi Warriors game was postponed too. Match week two did not fail to deliver drama with late goals and some talking points as we witnessed four draws and three wins. Here are five observations from Mayowa Kufile in Match Week Two. REMO STARS HAVE BEEN HERE BEFORE, CAN THEY GET OVER THE LINE? Remo Stars 1 Sunshine Stars…
The Nigeria Premier Football League, NPFL25 continued yesterday after experiencing the opening fixture a week before when league Champions Rangers International played a goalless draw against league-returning El-Kameni Warriors. Eight games went down yesterday in eight different NPFL25 centres with one more fixture this evening when Lobi Stars lock horns with 2021 Champions Akwa United at the Lafia Township Stadium. After every match week, I will give you five things I noticed during the game week. Here we go for match week one. WELCOME TO THE BIG BOYS LEAGUE For three seasons in a row, we have had a club…
You only have to visit the Mobolaji Johnson Arena in Lagos, a stadium used by Nigeria Premier Football League side Sporting Lagos for their home games to witness the popular chant “Let’s go Sporting, Let’s go”. This chant is orchestrated by the stadium announcer, chorused by passionate fans, and accompanied by hundreds of Vuvuzelas at the stadium. The chant is a wake-up call from the fans to the players to up the tempo on the pitch, get a goal, or create an uncomfortable atmosphere for the visiting teams and this is something that has been associated with Sporting Lagos from…
There is a popular saying in Nigeria that “a prophet is not appreciated in his/her vicinity but highly rated outside”, this means Nigerians don’t appreciate their own, and growing up we had this notion that a product made in Nigeria would have an inscription “made in China” just because you want Nigerians to rate such product highly. The idea that anything “foreign” means “better” is not only extended to product, but to personnel, and that is why some Nigerian football fans always root for a foreign coach whenever there is a vacancy for the position of coaching in the Super…
“In January, there’s a little tournament in Africa”, these are the words of Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp in 2021 as regards the biggest football competition in the continent, and a Twitter user @EmeritusTolu called it a “useless tournament” due to its timing. Whether you believe it is “little” or “useless”, is up for debate but one thing the 2023 edition of the Africa Cup Of Nations has shown is that even its greatest critics would have to be staunch haters not to have enjoyed the AFCON group stage that had it all. We have witnessed breathtaking moments of football, heartache…
AFCON GROUP D: Algeria (30), Angola (117), Burkina Faso (57), Mauritania (105) FIFA ranking in bracket. If there is ever a group I believe will not produce a third-best-placed team, it has to be this group because of the gap between the two top teams and the other two teams. Algeria might have failed to qualify from their group in 2022, but you don’t expect lightning to strike twice for the Desert Foxes. Alongside the semi-finalist from the last edition, Burkina Faso, this should make it an easy passage for both teams. Angola and Mauritania will likely not pick up…
AFCON GROUP C: Cameroun (46), Gambia (126), Guinea (80), Senegal (20) FIFA ranking in bracket Group C looks like an entertaining one because this group contains two of the last three winners of this competition (Cameroun in 2017 and Senegal in 2022), coupled with the addition of reawakening dark horses Guinea and one of the surprise packages last time out The Gambia, we are in for some mouthwatering games in this group. Group C Fixtures Jan. 15th: Senegal vs Gambia (15:00 WAT) Jan. 15th: Cameroun vs Guinea (18:00 WAT) Jan. 19th: Senegal vs Cameroun (18:00 WAT) Jan. 19th: Guinea vs…