Category: Football

One of the great shocks in world football this past week is Italy’s failure to qualify for the FIFA World Cup….for the third time in a row!! For Italy, it is a monumental DISASTER. The country’s Minister of Sports publicly...

I was one of many that did not like Chief Festus Onigbinde (that’s how he was referred to at the time) when I first encountered him half a Century ago, around 1976. He came in from the blue. He was...

So, in July of 1976, we went to China and returned, our narrow escape from the jaws of death, only a few minutes and some miles away from landing in the middle of the worst earthquake in the history of...

After hovering over the city of Peking (now Beijing) for a long time our plane finally landed almost at midnight. With stops in 4 cities since we departed Lagos on July 26, 1976, we had been airborne for a total...

Last week, Rivers United FC of Port Harcourt lost their home match in the ongoing 2025/2026 African Club Championship against The Pyramids FC of Morocco. Until that match, United were the last Nigerian football club still standing in this season’s...

I was not physically in Morocco for the 2025 edition of the African Cup of Nations football championship that ended a week ago. I followed the events from my humble observatory in the hills of Wasimi. It was generally, a...

It is not an end. Rather, I choose to embrace it as the start of a new beginning. That’s how I see the exit of the Super Eagles from the title chase for AFCON 2025. Now, more than at any...

It is the eve of AFCON 2025.  I am suffering from Super Eagles fatigue.  I am not paying the usual attention to the championship. The Super Eagles are there, of course. For a team that I have always supported all...

This is the world of sports. Nigeria was once described as the ‘Giant of Africa’. The country was ranked 5th on the FIFA table, and the Super Eagles were hailed as the most entertaining national team during the 1994 World...

I don’t know if he knows it. I don’t also know if it is deliberate, or an accident of fate. Whatever it is, however, Governor Dapo Abiodun of Ogun State, the ‘Man of the 2025 Gateway Games’, has successfully planted...