Nigerian football should have more Northerners

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Tobi17
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Nigerian football should have more Northerners

Post by Tobi17 »

I'm back with another controversial topic! To keep it short and simple, I think Nigeria has done a terrible job in exploring the talent pool among the North, the representation of Northerners in all our national teams have been poor, and it can't just be due to lack of enthusiasm on the part of Northerners in the round leather game.

For better context, has anyone noticed that all the more skillful players that play for Ghana are from the Northern region in Ghana, precisely Hausas?

Kudus
Kamaldeen Sulemana
Salisu
Baba Rahman
Sulley Muntari
Abdul Samed
etc

All these players I listed come from predominantly the Hausa speaking parts of the North, and they are among the best players Ghana had fielded...maybe it's time we try scout more in the North for football talents? it's no surprise that most of our best Southern players all came from football academies in the North.
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Re: Nigerian football should have more Northerner

Post by EMIR KONGI JAFFI JOFFA »

No comment. I’m a member of an oppressed minority on CE, my opinion on this topic might spark backlash from the entitled few who feel they’re a gift to Nigeria. All I’ll say is that almost every single Hausa Fulani that has ever played for SE has delivered……………naaaaaa lemme jus qip kwayet!

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Re: Nigerian football should have more Northerners

Post by Damunk »

It still comes down to limited (poor) scouting, esp at the youth level.
Like someone rightly pointed out recently, squads tend to reflect the catchment zone of where the coach operates from. Good example is the current u17 female team.
Another is Manu’s U17 teams (esp Nacho’s set) that had a large proportion of northerners. Amunike’s u17 team was kind of similar.
Nigeria is a big country but it’s no excuse at the SE level and tbh, I don’t think it applies.
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Re: Nigerian football should have more Northerners

Post by aykwes8 »

Tobi17 wrote: Tue Nov 29, 2022 5:54 am I'm back with another controversial topic! To keep it short and simple, I think Nigeria has done a terrible job in exploring the talent pool among the North, the representation of Northerners in all our national teams have been poor, and it can't just be due to lack of enthusiasm on the part of Northerners in the round leather game.

For better context, has anyone noticed that all the more skillful players that play for Ghana are from the Northern region in Ghana, precisely Hausas?

Kudus
Kamaldeen Sulemana
Salisu
Baba Rahman
Sulley Muntari
Abdul Samed
etc

All these players I listed come from predominantly the Hausa speaking parts of the North, and they are among the best players Ghana had fielded...maybe it's time we try scout more in the North for football talents? it's no surprise that most of our best Southern players all came from football academies in the North.
Only muntari and Kudus have at least one Hausa parent. The rest are all indigenous Northerners. Like Dagomba, Gonja, Gurunsi etc
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Re: Nigerian football should have more Northerners

Post by TonyTheTigerKiller »

Damunk wrote: Tue Nov 29, 2022 7:48 am It still comes down to limited (poor) scouting, esp at the youth level.
Like someone rightly pointed out recently, squads tend to reflect the catchment zone of where the coach operates from. Good example is the current u17 female team.
Another is Manu’s U17 teams (esp Nacho’s set) that had a large proportion of northerners. Amunike’s u17 team was kind of similar.
Nigeria is a big country but it’s no excuse at the SE level and tbh, I don’t think it applies.
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Re: Nigerian football should have more Northerners

Post by chuks69 »

Good mention and good observation. Our Super Eagles players are mostly selected based on their club profiles and club forms..
Our Northern bredas though skillful, dont have the mentality to succeed in EU, may be places like England, despite their obvious talent. See Ahmed Musa case as a case point, very good player, but was easily cut loose in England by Leicester City perhaps due to religious beliefs or cultural inadaptation.
If we have to select more Northerner in SE, we have to bin the club criteria and ranking criteria... Other notable mention of Northerners who havent done as expected with their promise, Musa Mohammed, Captain of U17-2013 class, and Manga Mohammed, Zakiri Mohammed etc..list goes on.
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Re: Nigerian football should have more Northerners

Post by waka-man »

chuks69 wrote: Tue Nov 29, 2022 4:03 pm Good mention and good observation. Our Super Eagles players are mostly selected based on their club profiles and club forms..
Our Northern bredas though skillful, dont have the mentality to succeed in EU, may be places like England, despite their obvious talent. See Ahmed Musa case as a case point, very good player, but was easily cut loose in England by Leicester City perhaps due to religious beliefs or cultural inadaptation.
If we have to select more Northerner in SE, we have to bin the club criteria and ranking criteria... Other notable mention of Northerners who havent done as expected with their promise, Musa Mohammed, Captain of U17-2013 class, and Manga Mohammed, Zakiri Mohammed etc..list goes on.
Yeah this makes no sense to me. Lots of players from the south have crashed and burned in Europe.

I agree with the title of the thread: we should have more northerners in our team. Any society that doesn’t make the most of its diverse parts of by definition weaker. As a southerner I’m ashamed at how imbalanced our teams are.

Folks have talked about scouting and I’m sure this is a major factor. Instability in large sectors in the north will not have helped, as will the fact that we have much denser corporate participation in the sport in the south.

This is not something you fix over-night by quotas or selection criteria. We should invest significantly now in grassroots football with a goal of having more balance in our team by the start of the 2030 WC qualifiers.
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Re: Nigerian football should have more Northerners

Post by lacidi »

What of athletics, basketball, boxing, wrestling, judo, physically challenged sports, etc? Do we need to give them special scouting too?
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Re: Nigerian football should have more Northerners

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Everyone should contribute to the success of the National team. The Northerners have proven their worth when given the opporrunity. Likewise the SE and SS. What are the others contributing really. If we remove the German born (Balogun) and English born (Aina) players, what are the others contributing to the team? Everybody has to contribute . Unnecessary noise is not a contribution.
Last edited by 1naija on Tue Nov 29, 2022 6:36 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Nigerian football should have more Northerners

Post by lacidi »

BTW we have several academies in the north even during the days of YSFON, so how come only southerners tend to graduate from these academies?
Maybe USA should also give a quota to white people in short distance races and basketball.
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Re: Nigerian football should have more Northerners

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1naija wrote: Tue Nov 29, 2022 6:14 pm Everyone should contribute to the success of the National team. The Northerners have proven their worth when given the opporrunity. Likewise the SE and SS. What are the others contributing really. If we removw thw German born (Balogun) and English born (Aina) players, what are the others contributing to the team? Everybody has to contribute . Unnecessary noise is not a contribution.
Balogun and Aina have not contributed more than the locally born players. Aina in particular is a bit part player in SE so why are you mentioning him? The likes of Osimhen, Iwobi, Ndidi, have contributed more than those 2 you mentioned and historically, the home grown lads have delivered more in SE than your Aina and Balogun.
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Re: Nigerian football should have more Northerners

Post by lacidi »

BTW do you guys know that Nasarawa Amazons is made up of 80% southerners?
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Re: Nigerian football should have more Northerners

Post by Rawlings »

Massa,
The fact that a Ghanaian has an Islamic-sounding name does not mean he comes from the north or he's Hausa.
There are Ashantis & Gas who become moslem and take Islamic names
E.g. Partey changed his name to Yakubu https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/footb ... igion.html
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Re: Nigerian football should have more Northerners

Post by akamoke »

Saying we should have more northerners in the team should not mean a quota system

From the original post I understood this to mean that we should give the northern clubs and academies as much attention as we do the Southern states
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Re: Nigerian football should have more Northerners

Post by lacidi »

akamoke wrote: Tue Nov 29, 2022 7:02 pm Saying we should have more northerners in the team should not mean a quota system

From the original post I understood this to mean that we should give the northern clubs and academies as much attention as we do the Southern states
So how did you come to the conclusion that the southern academies get more attention? Are you assuming that southerners in the national teams are recruited from southern academies?
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Re: Nigerian football should have more Northerners

Post by vancity eagle »

But we shouldn't be doing quotas.

If you want a "northerner"

HOW ABOUT YUSUF ALHASSAN IN MIDFIELD FOR HEAVENS SAKE !!!!!

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Re: Nigerian football should have more Northerners

Post by bret- hart »

Alot of Notherners have passed thru the youth ranks but they flop after the u20 level.Ibrahim muhammed, Haruna Lukman, Yahaya from ihenacho set, Rabiu Ibrahim etc It's odd how they flop at senior level yet their cousins from Senegal, Mali, Ghana etc seem to excel.
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Re: Nigerian football should have more Northerners

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bret- hart wrote: Tue Nov 29, 2022 7:38 pm Alot of Notherners have passed thru the youth ranks but they flop after the u20 level.Ibrahim muhammed, Haruna Lukman, Yahaya from ihenacho set, Rabiu Ibrahim etc It's odd how they flop at senior level yet their cousins from Senegal, Mali, Ghana etc seem to excel.
There could be a number of reasons for that, but lots of our best and most skillful players at youth levels have been Northerners, even your Daniel Daga is one...we definitely need more representation of Northerners in the SE, they bring a different dynamic of skill and work rate that we can benefit from...all these boring foreign born players we keep hinging our hopes on won't improve our football...we need to get back to playing the "Nigerian way'.
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Re: Nigerian football should have more Northerners

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bret- hart wrote: Tue Nov 29, 2022 7:38 pm Alot of Notherners have passed thru the youth ranks but they flop after the u20 level.Ibrahim muhammed, Haruna Lukman, Yahaya from ihenacho set, Rabiu Ibrahim etc It's odd how they flop at senior level yet their cousins from Senegal, Mali, Ghana etc seem to excel.
Lukman Haruna is not a Northerner.
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Re: Nigerian football should have more Northerners

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Rawlings wrote: Tue Nov 29, 2022 6:20 pm Massa,
The fact that a Ghanaian has an Islamic-sounding name does not mean he comes from the north or he's Hausa.
There are Ashantis & Gas who become moslem and take Islamic names
E.g. Partey changed his name to Yakubu https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/footb ... igion.html
Don’t mind the ignorant and loud location 419’ers. They don’t know anything about their country and make blanket assumptions. Funny to see some comments but cannot distinguish among the indigenous people within their borders.
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Re: Nigerian football should have more Northerners

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scholl wrote: Tue Nov 29, 2022 8:34 pm
Rawlings wrote: Tue Nov 29, 2022 6:20 pm Massa,
The fact that a Ghanaian has an Islamic-sounding name does not mean he comes from the north or he's Hausa.
There are Ashantis & Gas who become moslem and take Islamic names
E.g. Partey changed his name to Yakubu https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/footb ... igion.html
Don’t mind the ignorant and loud location 419’ers. They don’t know anything about their country and make blanket assumptions. Funny to see some comments but cannot distinguish among the indigenous people within their borders.
do you really want to start with the insults? cause I could mudsling and grovel in the mud with you if you really want this. Let this be your last warning son.
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Re: Nigerian football should have more Northerners

Post by 1naija »

What are you trying to say? That some people are not contributing to the Super Eagles at all at all?
lacidi wrote: Tue Nov 29, 2022 6:18 pm
1naija wrote: Tue Nov 29, 2022 6:14 pm Everyone should contribute to the success of the National team. The Northerners have proven their worth when given the opporrunity. Likewise the SE and SS. What are the others contributing really. If we removw thw German born (Balogun) and English born (Aina) players, what are the others contributing to the team? Everybody has to contribute . Unnecessary noise is not a contribution.
Balogun and Aina have not contributed more than the locally born players. Aina in particular is a bit part player in SE so why are you mentioning him? The likes of Osimhen, Iwobi, Ndidi, have contributed more than those 2 you mentioned and historically, the home grown lads have delivered more in SE than your Aina and Balogun.
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Re: Nigerian football should have more Northerners

Post by scholl »

Tobi17 wrote: Tue Nov 29, 2022 8:52 pm
scholl wrote: Tue Nov 29, 2022 8:34 pm
Rawlings wrote: Tue Nov 29, 2022 6:20 pm Massa,
The fact that a Ghanaian has an Islamic-sounding name does not mean he comes from the north or he's Hausa.
There are Ashantis & Gas who become moslem and take Islamic names
E.g. Partey changed his name to Yakubu https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/footb ... igion.html
Don’t mind the ignorant and loud location 419’ers. They don’t know anything about their country and make blanket assumptions. Funny to see some comments but cannot distinguish among the indigenous people within their borders.
do you really want to start with the insults? cause I could mudsling and grovel in the mud with you if you really want this. Let this be your last warning son.
I mention your name? Don’t come here with big mouth, empty threats and save all that energy for the shithole, Olodo country. So called country has eroded knowledge of the uniqueness and distinctions… don’t know Kanuri from Hausa or Nupe. Heck, I’ve seen many mumus assume Edo NE people as Hausa. Abeg, carry go jare!

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