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FROM AFRICA’S GIANTS TO FOOTBALL’S BACK DOOR: HOW DID NIGERIA GET HERE?
The Super Falcons are fighting for a World Cup route. The Super Eagles are watching another World Cup from home. The question is no longer who should resign—it is whether anyone is prepared to confront what has gone wrong.
There was a time when Nigeria entered African football competitions with a certain expectation.
Not arrogance.
Not entitlement.
Expectation.
The expectation that Nigeria would be there.
The expectation that Nigerian teams would qualify.
The expectation that Nigeria’s enormous pool of football talent would eventually produce another generation capable of competing with anybody on the continent and beyond.
Today, that confidence is becoming harder to defend.
Nigeria is still a football powerhouse by reputation.
But increasingly, the results are forcing us to ask whether the reputation has outlived the system that created it.
And that is the uncomfortable conversation we need to have.
THE SUPER FALCONS ARE NOT OUT. BUT WHY ARE WE CELEBRATING THE PLAY-OFF?
The Super Falcons remain alive in the race for the 2027 FIFA Women’s World Cup.
But after losing 1–0 to Cameroon in the WAFCON quarter-final on August 9, Nigeria now has to take another route.
The Falcons will face South Africa in a playoff, with the outcome determining whether Nigeria advances to the FIFA Women’s World Cup Play-Off Tournament.
That means the door is still open.
The players deserve our support.
They deserve encouragement.
They deserve the opportunity to fight for the country.
But there is also a question Nigerians should be allowed to ask without being accused of attacking the players:
How did the most successful women’s national team in Africa arrive at a point where qualification itself has become a prolonged struggle?
Nigeria has won the Women’s Africa Cup of Nations 10 times.
The Super Falcons have appeared at every Women’s World Cup from 1991 through 2023.
Yet the current qualification structure means that, after failing to reach the WAFCON semi-finals, Nigeria must now fight South Africa for another opportunity to reach the global play-off route.
This should not be used to insult the players.
It should be used to examine the system.
—
AND THE SUPER EAGLES?
The men’s national team has already provided an even more painful warning.
Nigeria failed to qualify for the 2026 FIFA World Cup.
Not merely because of one bad night.
Nigeria finished behind South Africa in the qualifying group and eventually entered the African playoff route. The Super Eagles defeated Gabon before losing the final to DR Congo on penalties after a 1–1 draw. DR Congo subsequently won the intercontinental playoff and qualified for the World Cup.
Nigeria will therefore miss the World Cup for the second consecutive edition.
And remember what makes this particularly difficult to explain:
The 2026 World Cup has expanded to 48 teams.
Africa has more opportunities than before.
Yet Nigeria is still not going.
That should make every serious football stakeholder uncomfortable.
Not because Nigeria must qualify for every tournament forever.
Football does not work that way.
But because repeated failure across different levels begins to look less like bad luck and more like a pattern.
—
LOOK AT THE YOUTH TEAMS
This is where the conversation becomes even more disturbing.
The senior teams cannot be separated from what happens underneath them.
Nigeria’s men’s U-17 team missed the 2023 FIFA U-17 World Cup.
It then missed the 2025 FIFA U-17 World Cup.
And in 2026, Nigeria failed to qualify for the CAF U-17 Africa Cup of Nations after losing to Ghana in the WAFU B semi-final.
Nigeria therefore did not even make the continental tournament from which the 2026 U-17 World Cup places were allocated. CAF’s final 2026 U-17 AFCON field included Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire from WAFU B—not Nigeria.
Think about what that means.
Nigeria once built a global reputation partly through its youth football.
Now, at the same age category that helped establish Nigeria as a football power, we are increasingly fighting simply to enter the room.
That is not a one-match problem.
That is a development problem.
—
THE LIST IS BECOMING TOO LONG
Look at the recent record.
2023 — Nigeria fail to qualify for the Men’s U-23 AFCON, consequently missing the 2024 Olympic men’s football tournament.
2023 — Golden Eaglets fail to qualify for the FIFA U-17 World Cup.
2025 — Nigeria fail to qualify for the FIFA U-17 World Cup.
2026 — Nigeria fail to qualify for the Men’s U-17 AFCON and therefore the FIFA U-17 World Cup.
2026 — Super Eagles fail to qualify for the FIFA World Cup.
2026 — Super Falcons fail to reach the WAFCON semi-finals and must now use a playoff route to keep their 2027 World Cup hopes alive.
That is not a single failure.
It is a pattern across age groups and across genders.
And patterns demand structural questions.
—
THIS IS WHERE ITALY SHOULD MAKE US THINK
Italy is one of the greatest football nations in history.
Four World Cup titles.
A European Championship.
One of the world’s most famous domestic leagues.
Some of the biggest clubs and football brands on the planet.
Yet Italy failed to qualify for the 2018 World Cup.
Then 2022.
Then 2026.
Three consecutive World Cups without Italy.
In March 2026, Italy’s latest attempt ended in Bosnia and Herzegovina, where the Azzurri drew 1–1 before losing 4–1 on penalties.
But look at what happened afterwards.
Italy did not simply spend all its energy asking:
“Who should we blame for losing this match?”
The Italian Football Federation published a report examining the health of the entire football system.
And some of the numbers were shocking.
The FIGC report said only 1.9% of Serie A minutes were being played by U21 players eligible for Italy.
Only two Italian academies—Atalanta and Juventus—appeared in the world’s top 50 youth academies measured by ten-year revenue from homegrown-player sales.
The report also identified structural problems involving youth development, league organisation, refereeing, stadiums, governance and the relationship between the federation, leagues and other football institutions.
That is the lesson.
Italy’s problem was not simply:
“We lost the match.”
The question became:
“What is happening inside the football system that keeps producing this outcome?”
That is exactly the question Nigeria should be asking.
—
ITALY’S FAILURE WAS A WARNING. NIGERIA SHOULD HEAR IT.
There is a dangerous temptation in Nigerian football to treat every failure as an isolated event.
Lose a qualifier?
Blame the coach.
Miss a tournament?
Blame the players.
Fail to develop young players?
Blame the generation.
Poor league?
Blame the clubs.
Poor facilities?
Blame government.
Poor refereeing?
Blame the referees.
Players leave for Europe?
Celebrate their success abroad.
Then wait for the next national-team assignment.
And repeat the cycle.
But eventually the excuses become more exhausting than the failures.
Because if the same problems keep appearing across different coaches, different players, different competitions and different administrations, then perhaps the problem is bigger than any individual.
—
WE HAVE BECOME TOO COMFORTABLE WITH THE WORD “POTENTIAL”
Nigeria has potential.
Nigeria has talent.
Nigeria has population.
Nigeria has football history.
Nigeria has passionate supporters.
Nigeria has players in major European leagues.
Nigeria has academies.
Nigeria has coaches.
Nigeria has former internationals.
Nigeria has football administrators.
Nigeria has facilities.
Nigeria has sponsors.
Nigeria has government sports agencies.
Nigeria has the NFF.
Nigeria has everything required to build a serious football industry.
So why does the output increasingly look unstable?
That is the uncomfortable question.
Because talent alone does not produce football nations.
Systems do.
—
THE DIASPORA CANNOT BE THE DEVELOPMENT PLAN
There is nothing wrong with Nigerian players developing abroad.
In fact, it is a strength that Nigerian footballers can succeed in England, Italy, Spain, France, Germany and elsewhere.
But we should be careful.
If the solution to every problem is:
“Let’s find another Nigerian player abroad,”
then we are not developing Nigerian football.
We are developing a scouting network for the rest of the world.
The domestic league should be producing players.
The academies should be producing players.
Schools should be producing players.
Coaches should be developing players.
Sports science should be developing players.
Competitions should be developing players.
And the national teams should be the final expression of that system.
Not the emergency repair shop.
—
WHAT ARE WE ACTUALLY BUILDING?
This is where the debate about coaching courses, refereeing programmes, infrastructure and football administration must become serious.
Yes, CAF coaching courses matter.
Yes, referee development matters.
Yes, FIFA Goal Project pitches matter.
Yes, hostels matter.
Yes, hosting WAFU competitions matters.
Yes, international football programmes matter.
Yes, bringing CAF events to Nigeria matters.
But development cannot be measured by the number of ceremonies we hold.
It must be measured by what those investments produce.
How many qualified coaches are actually working regularly?
How many young referees are progressing?
How many properly managed academies exist?
How many Nigerian clubs can develop and retain talent?
How many players are making a sustainable living in the domestic game?
How many youth teams are consistently qualifying?
How many Nigerian clubs are competing deep into CAF competitions?
How many players are graduating from the Nigerian league directly into elite international football?
Those are the numbers that should matter.
—
THIS IS NOT A CALL FOR SOMEBODY TO RESIGN
And this is important.
The point of this conversation should not be to start another campaign demanding that one person resign.
Nigeria has done that before.
A coach leaves.
Another coach arrives.
An administrator leaves.
Another administrator arrives.
A new committee is announced.
A new technical adviser is appointed.
A new plan is launched.
Then three years later, we are having the same conversation.
That is not reform.
Reform is when the system changes enough that the next generation does not inherit the same problem.
Italy’s experience is instructive precisely because its post-failure discussion has gone beyond the scoreboard.
Its federation identified youth development, player pathways, league structures, governance, refereeing and infrastructure as interconnected issues.
That is the conversation Nigeria needs.
—
SO, WHAT SHOULD PEOPLE DO?
Perhaps the most important question is not:
“Who should resign?”
It is:
“Who is responsible for fixing what?”
The NFF should be able to publish measurable football-development targets.
The leagues should be judged by the quality and commercial strength of their competitions.
Clubs should be required to demonstrate genuine youth-development structures.
Government should be judged by the facilities and policies it actually delivers—not by announcements.
Coaches should be judged not only by trophies but by player development.
Academies should be judged by the quality of players they produce.
Refereeing should be judged by professional standards and development pathways.
And national teams should be judged by both results and the strength of the pipeline producing the players.
Most importantly, Nigerians should demand data.
Not slogans.
Not photographs.
Not speeches.
Data.
How many licensed coaches?
How many active academies?
How many registered youth players?
How many professional contracts?
How many domestic players moving abroad?
How many clubs meeting professional licensing standards?
How many young players receiving consistent competitive minutes?
How many coaches are employed full-time?
How many referees are moving through the development pathway?
What is the annual investment in grassroots football?
What has improved compared with five years ago?
That is how serious football nations measure themselves.
—
THE SUPER FALCONS ARE STILL FIGHTING. SO SHOULD WE.
The Super Falcons have not been eliminated from the 2027 World Cup race.
They now have another battle ahead against South Africa.
They deserve our support.
But supporting the players does not mean refusing to ask difficult questions.
In fact, supporting them means asking those questions.
Because the players should not have to carry the entire weight of Nigerian football on their shoulders.
The national teams cannot permanently compensate for weaknesses in the domestic system.
At some point, the system itself must become strong.
—
NIGERIA DOES NOT NEED ANOTHER BLAME GAME. IT NEEDS A FOOTBALL AUDIT.
Perhaps this is the moment to stop asking:
“Who caused this?”
And start asking:
“What exactly is broken?”
Where is the player pathway?
Where is the professional league?
Where is the youth structure?
Where is the coaching pipeline?
Where is the referee pathway?
Where is the commercial model?
Where is the data?
Where is the accountability?
Where is the long-term plan?
And who is responsible for each part?
Italy discovered that a football giant can remain a football giant in reputation while its underlying system begins to deteriorate.
Nigeria should not wait for three consecutive World Cup failures before taking the warning seriously.
Because the most dangerous thing about Nigerian football today is not that we lost a match.
It is that we are becoming accustomed to needing another chance.
Another playoff.
Another qualification route.
Another rescue.
Another miracle.
Another generation of players to save us.
And another explanation when it fails.
THE QUESTION IS NO LONGER WHETHER NIGERIA HAS TALENT.
THE QUESTION IS WHETHER NIGERIA HAS BUILT A SYSTEM WORTHY OF THAT TALENT.
Because a football nation should not live permanently on its history.
And Nigeria’s history is too great to become an excuse for its present.
The trophies tell us what Nigeria once was.
The qualification struggles are telling us what Nigeria has become.
What we do next will determine what Nigeria becomes.
Nigeria has been identified among high-volume markets where a new $1 testing package could help expand screening of pregnant women for HIV, syphilis and hepatitis B.
The package, launched by Premier Medical Corporation and Impact Nexus Africa, combines two rapid diagnostic tests under a single commercial offer for use through existing antenatal care services.
The companies said their analysis identified Nigeria, Ethiopia, Tanzania, Uganda, Kenya, Mozambique and South Africa among the countries with the largest potential markets for antenatal hepatitis B screening.
Impact Nexus Africa estimates that the package could generate about $215 million in commodity savings across 74 low- and middle-income countries between 2026 and 2035, if adopted across antenatal care at the modelled volumes.
However, the estimate is based on modelling and does not represent confirmed savings for individual countries, including Nigeria.
How the package works
The Triple Elimination Testing Bundle costs $1 ex-works per woman screened and contains two separate rapid diagnostic tests.
One is the World Health Organisation’s (WHO)-prequalified First Response HIV 1+2/Syphilis Combo Card Test, which screens for HIV and syphilis simultaneously.
The second is the First Response hepatitis B surface antigen (HBsAg) Card Test, which screens for a marker of hepatitis B infection.
The tests remain separate products but are supplied together as a single commercial offer.
The price also includes access to digital training, assessment and competency tools for end users.
The $1 price excludes freight, local distribution, taxes, regulatory costs and other programme or implementation expenses. Orders are subject to a minimum quantity of 100,000 bundles.
Potential savings
According to the companies, the package is between 22 per cent and 46 per cent cheaper in commodity terms than procuring equivalent HIV/syphilis and hepatitis B rapid diagnostic tests separately.
The analysis estimates an addressable market of about 37.8 million antenatal HBsAg tests annually across 74 low- and middle-income countries.
It projects that using the package instead of separately procured tests could generate about $215 million in commodity savings over 10 years.
The companies said annual savings could exceed $10 million in some high-volume markets, while they could remain below US$1 million in smaller markets.
Actual savings, however, would depend on countries’ existing procurement prices, testing volumes and the scale and pace of implementation, according to the analysis.
They also estimate that the modelled rollout could identify HBsAg-positive pregnancies in about 17.1 million women and contribute to averting approximately 2.7 million infant hepatitis B infections between 2026 and 2035.
It said the health impact projections depend on screening uptake, local hepatitis B prevalence and successful linkage of women who test positive to recommended maternal and infant interventions.
Why hepatitis B screening matters
The initiative is aimed at supporting the global effort to eliminate mother-to-child transmission of HIV, syphilis and hepatitis B.
The WHO recommends testing pregnant women for HIV, syphilis and hepatitis B at least once during pregnancy and as early as possible.
While HIV and syphilis screening have increasingly been incorporated into antenatal care, hepatitis B screening remains less consistently implemented across countries.
The companies said the new package could therefore serve both countries that already provide hepatitis B screening and those seeking to introduce or expand it.
They said the approach builds on existing antenatal care systems rather than requiring countries to establish a separate testing platform.
What the package could mean for Nigeria
For Nigeria, the significance of the package goes beyond its lower price.
A 2026 analysis of Nigeria Demographic and Health Survey data found that although 72 per cent of mothers attended antenatal care, only 12.3 per cent were tested for hepatitis B during pregnancy.
Earlier national data also highlighted the gap. An analysis of about 2.8 million pregnant women who received antenatal care across more than 6,000 facilities providing prevention of mother-to-child transmission services found that only 7.2 per cent were screened for hepatitis B.
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The Federal Ministry of Health and Social Welfare has also been working to strengthen hepatitis B screening as part of Nigeria’s triple-elimination response. In 2025, the ministry said it planned to introduce free hepatitis B testing, treatment and care for pregnant women who test positive.
Against this backdrop, the new bundle could offer Nigeria a lower-cost option for expanding hepatitis B screening through existing antenatal care services.
The companies said the package is available to public and private sector purchasers across all low and middle-income countries, subject to national registration, importation and procurement requirements.
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