Sports
FIFA U-17 AYC: Ghana Plots Cote d’ Ivoire Nigeria, Ban
Former Ghana FA chief Ben Koufie is going to recommend to FIFA that Nigeria and Ivory Coast are banned from playing in the Under-17 World Cup because they age-cheated their way to qualify for the competition.
Magnetic Resonance Image (MRI) scans have been used by both FIFA and the Confederation of African Football to check on the true ages of players as the clampdown on age-cheats intensifies.
Nine players were banned from the African Under-17 event after failing tests recently.
Now Nigeria and Ivory Coast have qualified for the World Cup to be held in the United Arab Emirates later this year and have gone on to reach Saturday’s Final in Morocco.
Koufie wants FIFA to enforce tougher punishments for age-cheats and their countries taking part in age-group competitions.
“I am going to make some recommendations to FIFA that it should just not be a matter of disqualifying players from tournaments when they have failed their MRI in a specific competition,” Koufie said
“If the players played in the qualifying matches for that competition, that team must be disqualified because it used disqualified players in the qualifying process.
“Once you are caught and it is proven that the player played in the qualifying matches then you have to be disqualified.
“I am worried about it because it is not fair at all to the youngsters. It is called U-17 because it is a development stage.
“If you now bring 20 to 25-year-olds to play in that competition then it is an injustice,” he added.
The former Black Stares boss has been a strong critic of age-cheating over the years and believes the problem lies not only with dishonest player’s but also with coaches and administrators.
“Coaching at this level must be taken seriously because that is the formative stage. The U-17 is not a must-win area,” he said.
“It should be a chance for the boys to learn at a competitive level, that is the assessment. We are incorrectly using it now as a real competition where they must win.
“Sometimes in football you lose in order to learn and in the process learn to win. They may lose but they must learn from their losses,” he says.
All four teams – champions Ivory Coast, runners-up Nigeria, Tunisia and Morocco – have qualified for the FIFA Under-17 World Cup in United Arab Emirates from 17 October to 8 November.
England captain Harry Kane netted a hat-trick to guide Bayern Munich to an impressive victory against Stuttgart.
Kane’s goals, plus one from Kingsley Coman, helped Bayern end a three-game winless run in all competitions.
They faced a tough task against a Stuttgart side who sat back and limited their chances, leading Vincent Kompany’s side to enter the break frustrated and with the deadlock unbroken.
Bayern eventually found a way past Stuttgart’s steely defence when Kane drilled a low effort into the bottom corner from around 30 yards out after Joshua Kimmich overturned possession.
Former Nigeria goalkeeper, Dosu Joseph, is full of thanks to God after he miraculously survived another life-threatening automobile accident recent at Kara, along the Lagos-Ibadan Express Way, where a heavy-duty truck ran into his SUV.
Narrating his ordeal, the 51-year-old, who guided Nigeria to gold in the Men’s Football Tournament of the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, broke the news in a statement on his social media handles on Friday.
“To God be the glory, another death escaped by Grace and Mercy of God. Me and my friend SM were at Enyo Filling Station after Ojodu Berger bus stop to get fuel on Wednesday, October 2, 2024, around 6 p.m. when this MACK truck fully loaded with iron, with registration number LND 470 XX, left the road and crushed my car beyond repairs. Thank God for life,” he stated.
This is the second time the soft-spoken club proprietor will cheat death by a whisker, having been involved in an accident in 1997 that ended his career at 23 and left his spinal cord in bad shape.
He helped Julius Berger win the Nigeria FA Cup in November 1997 shortly a memorable Olympic outing by keeping a clean sheet in the finals against Katsina United. The following year, he was involved in the auto along Ikorodu Road, Lagos, which not only cut his career short but also left him almost paralysed, ending his spell at Serie A club Reggiana.
The former Nigeria international, who also kept goal for Julius Berger FC, said the case has been reported to Isheri Police Station, Ogun State, where the driver is currently detained and the truck also seized.
According to him, the owner of the truck said he can’t fix the badly damaged SUV until after a year.
Ex – Super Eagles of Nigeria, Okwuchukwu Waobikeze has observed that sports development in Nigeria is going down.
According to him, grassroots sports is very important, without it, the administrators cannot get it right. So everybody should key into grassroots sports development, he said.
Waobikeze said this last Wednesday in an interview with sports journalists shortly after the Port Harcourt All Stars Independence football festival (OCTOBERFEST) at the Port Harcourt club, Rivers State.
He explained that for sports administrators to get it right, grassroots development is key. “They should be organising competition at the grassroots level to fish out the young ones for different sporting activities.
“Grassroots sports is very important so the administrators have to go back to the grassroots.
” Sports Development in Nigeria is going down we need to go back to the basics.
“Look at the just concluded Paris Olympics, Nigeria did not win any medal.
” Our football team did not even qualify for the Olympics. We are going down.
” If they should go back to the grassroots, they will get young ones in the games and talents will be developed.
” I started from school games, to youth games before playing for the national team. Now everybody wants to fly board to play professional football and a lot do not know the basics of the game.
” A lot of people did not know the little things about the game, they just want to play. It is not done so,” Waobikeze stated.
Kiadum Edookor