Daily Independent (Lagos)
Julius Okorie
2 January 2009
Lagos — The disappointments in sports in 2008 have come and gone but it behoves the country's sports administrators to aim at righting the wrongs of the recent past. The only way this can be achieved is through brilliant performance of teams at various championships this year.
Talking about breaking through, the importance of having a pool of younger players to choose from on one hand and replace tired legs on the other cannot be over emphasised.
With hard work and element of luck, some of these young players become instant hit and begin to enjoy the harvest of their hard work quite early in life.
A good example is Super Eagles Captain Kanu Nwankwo. The Portsmouth striker and former Arsenal ace captained Nigeria's Olympic team in 1996 and returned home from Atlanta with the soccer gold. Although his desire to win the Nations Cup has been elusive, there is no doubt that Kanu who is the most highly decorated African footballer having won a UEFA Champions League medal, a UEFA Cup medal, three F.A. Cup Winners medals and two African Player of the Year awards plus an Olympic gold medal has paid his dues
His exploit underlines the gains derivable from having an effective youth developmental plan.
It will be recalled that his excellent performance at the U-17 World Championship earned him a sign on by Ajax Amsterdam where his international career took off.
He represents a good example of how a young player can progress from stage to stage. The piece is however not about Kanu who can be said to have made a huge success of his career, but about young player, Haruna Lukman, who appears to be set to progress in the same direction.
Lukman, 18 played for mostly youth clubs, notable among them Moderate Stars Academy and Global Crystal Academy, before making his way into the national teams. He captained the Nigerian U-17 side that clinched both African and world U-17 titles in 2007.
After that success in South Korea under late Yemi Tella, Lukman became the toast of European clubs like Real Madrid, Atletico Madrid, FC Porto and Benfica among others, but he preferred to settle for the feeder team of AS Monaco after which he signed for the club early January last year.
Already Lukman has been tipped to captain Nigeria's Flying Eagles to the Africa Youth Championship billed for Rwanda this month.
After failing to fly in Warri at the WAFU U-20 championship, the team already condemned by many sports pundits, may surprisingly perform well in Rwanda, but the input of the likes of Lukman will no doubt be necessary to save embattled Ladan Bosso from further flops.
Indication that he will be an asset to the team emerged in one of the clashes against Sudan, that ended 5-0 in favour of Nigeria.
As early as the 17th minute, Lukman had flagged off scoring with a close range effort, opening the floodgate for Gani Oseni, Emenike Nkume, who scored a brace, and Gbolahan Salami.
To look back and see some young players good enough to step into the shoes of fading ones is one thing that tickles the likes of former Head, Technical Department, Nigeria Football Federation (NFF), Kashimawo Laloko, and the federation's current technical consultant and FIFA Technical Committee member, Adegboye Onigbinde.
According to the duo, who can be said to know where the shoe pinches in football today in the country, any system that does not provide for continuous identification and grooming of young talents is not good enough.
"There is need for the football house to work closely with academies in the country to harness abundant talents that we have been blessed with. Players are supposed to graduate from one level to the other, so that at any point, you have cadet players that can fit into their class and then make their way gradually into the senior team, that is how it works," said Laloko.
Most coaches believe that players who rose by the ranks last longer and make better impact. Little wonder the call for emphasis on grassroots development is getting louder by the day, especially in the light of avalanche of failures last year.
"Our emphasis should be on development of talents, not on winning at all cost by using ready-made players," Onigbinde told **Saturday Independent** in a recent chat.
Although he could only be said to be flagging off his career in the real sense of it, the case of Lukman is one that should motivate other young players. Unlike some of his colleagues, who played for league clubs briefly at home before heading for Europe, Lukman displayed enough talent to attract attention even while playing for academies. When the opportunity to play for the National U-17 came, he made his impact and that marked a turning point in his career. Playing at the world level is indeed a rare opportunity that should give up-and-coming players a platform to showcase their skills. The possibility of getting a leap from that stage is very high as it often attracts scouts from all over the globe. Lukman could be a plus judging from his take-off point, but we should not be satisfied having just few players that can last the distance.
Like Head Coach and Training, National Institute for Sports, Solomon Abari, said, it is time to beef up all youth championships, schools sports and other tournaments that bring out the best in the youths. This is the only way the nation can maintain a respectable position in youth competitions, not only in the continent but also in the world.
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