Our continent, Our trophy?

Our Continent, Our Trophy




This slogan started gaining the airwaves since South Africa hosted the Confederation Cup last year.



The South Africans actually thought they would win the Cup and picked up that slogan.



Then Ghana went one better and won the World Youth Championships in Egypt. Yeah, it was really Our Continent, Our Trophy.



At the U-17 championships hosted by Nigeria, the slogan came up again and though the Nigerian team tried they could only get to the final and lose.



And we have not stopped ever since. We have continued to talk about how this is an African World Cup and how it will all make sense if an African side can win it but nobody has told us which of the African sides they think can win it.



Ever since the great football sage, Edson Arantes Do Nascimento, also known as Pele “prophesied” that an African country will win the World Cup before the turn of the 21st century, the whole continent have been under pressure.



Even though Pele has since come out to either say he was misquoted or his words were taken out of context, the hunger for an African country to win the World Cup has become more insatiable than ever before.



In 1990 a lot of fans actually thought the Roger Milla team would do the continent proud (didn’t they?)



When they met their real match in the quarter finals they crumbled like a pack of cards even though they could have easily beaten the English.



In 1994 we all thought Nigeria would be that team but a lethargic Italy with half fit players sent us packing the second round.

1998 should have surely been Africa’s year but that has been our worst performance in recent times and in 2002 when the Teranga Lions of Senegal seemed on a roll they got their reality check in the quarters against Turkey.



The whole of Africa still probably remember the 2006 World Cup and how only Ghana made it to the second round and what the rampaging Brazilians did to them.



Now why can’t Africa win the World Cup in 2010 or anytime soon?



African countries are yet to understand that football is not all about 90 minutes on the pitch.



They have also failed to understand that people do not win matches simply because they have quality players.



Greece would never have won the European championships the year they did if it was simply about players.



So can Africa win the World Cup finally in 2010? NEVER! The continent is simply not ready yet and this is a fact whether we like it or whether we admit it or not.



There is more to winning a World Cup than simply just thinking, “Our continent, our trophy”.



First a country must have the quality in terms of man power or playing personel. It is not enough to just have a John Mikel Obi playing at Chelsea, a Micheal Essien playing at the same Chelsea, a Samuel Eto’o at Inter Milan or a Benni McCarthy playing at West Ham. You must have a lot of quality in one team to be able to carry the others along. When it comes to quality in playing personnel, the Ivoriens are closest to it.

The likes of Didier Drogba, Kolo Toure, Yaya Toure, Didier Zokora, Salomon Kalou, Zezeto, Romaric, Emmanuel Eboue and Gervinho certainly is enough quality to having a shouting chance at the trophy but having quality players is just one of many qualities a team must have.



After having quality players which no doubt the Ivoriens do have, there are other factors.



Organisation: This is where a lot of African countries err. Apart from maybe the North Africans, most are not organised.

Travel arrangements for players is like rocket science to them; coordinating a friendly match seems like something that will bother Albert Einstein and it is no wonder why players find it difficult reporting to camp for games or tournaments because things seem so different especially for the Europe based players who are used to better organisation.

To organise simply means to establish, institute, set up, construct, put together, arrange and coordinate.



Are those of us in africa close to any of these? Most of the FAs in africa are in total shambles and the situations does not look like changing any time soon.



Planning: This is another criteria for winning where the Africans fail woefully. Why do Africans fail to plan? Somebody said a man who fails to plan is planning to fail.



Nobody just wakes up in the morning and plans to win the next World Cup without putting things in proper perspective.



I remember as a kid watching tha video of “The history of the World Cup” and i still have vivid memories of myself crying with th Brazilians after they lost the 1950 final to Uruguay. Why did a 12 year old start crying for something his father even knew nothing about? The passion around the Brazilan game? Maybe. Put most of all, the Brazilians picked the pieces up and won the Cup 8 years later; eight years after losing a bitter final on home soil. Is that planning? I do not know what else is.



In 1998 the Americans performed woefully at the World Cup and they set up a committee to win the World Cup in 2010, a whole 12 years later. Midway into their planning they realised winning the Cup would not be realistic as a target so they modified it to “Being a threat at the 2010 World Cup”



Did anybody watch the Confederations Cup last year?



Nobody achieves anything that did not plan for that thing. Do africans plan? Not that i know of.



Winning mentality: Nobody goes to battle planning to lose or not thinking of winning. Ask any Ivorien player, nigerian, ghanaian, Camerounian or Algerian player if their countries can win the World Cup and hear their responses.



Then ask any Brazilian, Spanish, Argentine, English or Spanish player the same questions and see how different these responses will be.



No african player playing in the World Cup this year thinks he will be kissing the trophy in July as compared to their counterparts from Europe and America.



Those in Africa still feel inferior to the Europeans and South Americans so talking about winning the World Cup is just dream talk.





World Class manager: Has any African country ever had a World Class manager on her bench? Not too many.

Can average journey men coaches that Europe and South America have exported to Africa over the years cannot not and will never win anything with the average and below average African sides.



A quality coach like Otto Renaghel can win with an average side like the Greek team in 2004.



The same way and average coach like Clemence Westahof could win with the Super Nigerian team of 1992-94.



But average coach + average team is certainly equal to average performance and that has been the lot of African sides in the past.



Amongst five countries representing Africa at the World Cup, perhaps only the South Africans have a real coach but he has to face a very poor team in training every day.

Consistency: This is the major problem of footballing in Africa. No consistency especially with coaches. We sack them at every bad turn and football can hardly ever grow that way.



Nigerians are the biggest culprits here.



Since Clemence Westahof left in 1994 (remember he stayed five years) we have sacked coaches every two years and that has hardly helped football in Nigeria grow.



Just in February, two weeks after leading the Nigerian side to winning the bronze medal at the Africa Cup of Nations, Nigerian manager, Shaibu Amodu was sacked because Nigerians thought he was a bad coach and will disgrace the country at the World Cup.



One month later, the Swede, Lars Lagerback was appointed in his place. He had no FIFA window to meet the players and only had his first session with the team in May after the European Leagues ended, yet he said Nigeria had the potentials to play in the semi finals, LIAR!



The Ivoriens did the same thing, sacking their coach on the last day of February and he would have the same problem with the Nigerian coach because there was really no time to look at the players.



Discipline: Most African players do not see returning home to their countries to play football as serious business. Rather they see it as a time to burst loose from their rigid and disciplined European clubs.



Time to sow wild oats, binge drink and generally indulge; and all this is done during competition time.



In Nigeria, players report home for one off matches and go see their friends and parents for at least a day or two before reporting for the games. Discipline? We certainly do not have it in Africa.



At the Cup of Nations in 2004, three Nigerian players were sent home because they were caught with ladies in their hotel; at the Cup of Nations in Ghana which i attended there were similar but unreported sex scandals.



At the World Cup in 2002 when we watched Senegal play good football we thought they would go past the Turks and play in the semi final but were shocked the Teranga Lions players were so immobile through out the match.





Unconfirmed reports had it that most of them slept late in the night on the eve of the match, partying in celebration of their outstanding feat of reaching the World Cup quarter finals.



That is the lot of Africa.



Can Africa win the World Cup in 2010? NEVER! Can Africa win it any time soon? A lot of things have to change. Our attitude to games, organisation, mentality, consistency and discipline.



Without these we would postpone winning the World Cup to 2014 and then 2018 and then 2022 yet we still would not win it.



Our continent, our trophy! How possible?