Our latest heroes, the Golden Eaglets returned to a well-deserved tumultuous welcome at the Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Lagos, Tuesday. Lagos governor, Babatunde Raji Fashola led other eminent Nigerians to receive the Under-17 team. Amos Adamu, Director General at the National Sports Commission, was naturally in an expansive mood as he joined the party. So were Sani Lulu, the never-say-quit chairman of the Nigeria Football Association, NFA, and Oyuki Obaseki, chairman of the Nigeria Football League, NFL, just to mention a few.

Lagosians were not left out of the party. They thronged the airport in their thousands and lined the routes for as long as it was feasible. The airport crowd shuffled and pushed as people struggled to catch a glimpse of the new kings of world’s cadet soccer. Many sang. Several danced. Some waohed, while others howled to show their excitement. Everyone, young and old, wanted to touch the boys. The Eaglets had landed, there was joy in the land. Even those who bayed for blood when Fanny Amun, as NFA’s Secretary General, appointed Tella, his former teacher at the Nigerian Institute for Sports, as the team’s coach, could not hide their excitement. That is understandable. After all, it is said that success has many fathers while failure is a ragged orphan. I celebrated too. I toasted the boys with a criminally cold bottle of kunu.

Whether you call it kiddies’ or teenagers’ cup, like some mischief makers may want to dub it, this victory, to me, is as sweet as bringing the world cup itself home. With three gold and two silver medals in age-grade championships, not even almighty Brazil can hiss at our record. But apart from the fact that our boys played their hearts out and outclassed their opponents in every department of the game, during the recently concluded championship, their conduct on the field of play was highly commendable. There were no embarrassing moments. None of them charged at referees or their assistants to contest controversial decisions. They never substituted fists for legs as many an uncultured player would do. They played clean and won hearts and fans all over the world. They made us really proud. They are indeed our worthy ambassadors.

I’m sure President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua would tell them the mind of Nigerians as he rolls out the red carpet for the glorious boys at the Eagles Square in Abuja tomorrow. The president must go beyond the usual golden handshake and show the appreciation of this grateful nation in tangible terms. University scholarships will not be a bad starting point. Mr. President, help them seek and acquire academic excellence at the highest level possible and every other thing may follow. With a good degree in the kitty, they would have assured their future against any untoward eventuality, like an abrupt end to their soccer career due to injury.

Then, we must not forget Yemi Tella, the alchemist from whose workshop the wonder boys were moulded and turned into an all-conquering team that they became. A teacher at the National Institute for Sports, NIS, Tella’s appointment as coach of the Under-17 national team created vitriolic reactions. Many yelled for Amun’s head for having the audacity to saddle an ‘ordinary teacher’ with such a heavy responsibility. And since this teacher was ‘nobody’, the antagonists scoffed and doubted if any tangible thing would come from his camp during the then approaching 11th edition of the U-17 championship.

Loquacious Amun was given all sorts of names. But he never looked back. Tella, the quiet ‘professor’ was derided and given all sorts of names. He was variously dubbed ‘illegal coach’, ‘ a common teacher’, and so on. He never bothered too. Amun stuck to his guns. He saw what his critics couldn’t see. He knew, and had actually experienced the magical touch of ‘professor’ Tella. Amun’s gamble paid off. The man won virtually all his matches in grand style. But unknown to us, Tella had started the real battle of his life, the battle against cancer, if reports to that effect are to be held sacrosanct. Unknown to us, Tella, our hero, had begun a gradual descent from hero to life’s ground zero.

He was an unusual coach in Korea. He just sat on the bench, sometimes expressionless, as his wards scored great goals. His pictures on the screen, during the competition, showed a man fighting excruciating pain when his compatriots were intoxicated with joy. He sat on the bench almost throughout the tournament. And each time we roared in thunderous acclaim for a superlative goal by the boys, he either raised his hands feebly or sat weakly. His sickness tears at our heart the way a tiger claws a hapless prey. God, let this cancer story not be true. But if it is really true, God do something for the sake of millions of Nigerians to whom his good works have brought joy. Heal him, God. Excise the cancer. Inject his body with your healing oil and let the cancer dissolve into oblivion.

Tella surely needs our prayers, if this cancer story is true. He also needs every support he can get from this nation for which he has offered so much. As the President fetes Tella and his boys in Abuja tomorrow, he must give the traumatised coach cause to smile and real reason to win the battle against the deadly disease. He must be given the best treatment our money can buy. This is one big match Tella must not lose. Nigeria must assist him to win. And President Yar’Adua must kick-start that process tomorrow.

SHOULDN’T WE STILL NOT RESPECT LOCAL COACHES

Local coaches have, over time, made powerful statements about their ability to perform and impress at the big stage. Here are some examples. In 2005, Samson Siasia led the Flying Eagles to a silver medal that shone as bright as gold in Holland, losing narrowly (1-2) to Argentina in the final. Last July, Ladan Bosso led another bunch of Flying Eagles to a fairly impressive outing in Canada. Though Bosso’s team lost 0-3 in the last 15 minutes of extra time to Mexico, his modest effort was, nonetheless, appreciated by many Nigerians who knew full well that he was sent to the competition like a farmer without basic tools to till the land for a bountiful harvest.

Despite the travails of ill-health, Yemi Tella took the Golden Eaglets to Korea and made us smile again with gold. Even as we continue to enjoy the sweet aroma of that glorious outing, another coach, Ntiero Effiom, is currently in China with the Super Falcons. On Tuesday, our girls, (pitched against Korea, the United States and Sweden in the so-called group of death), held Sweden to a draw in an energy-sapping duel.
At the senior level, we have had Adegboye Onigbinde, ‘Chairman’ Christian Chukwu and lately, Austin Eguavoen who took the Super Eagles to last year’s Nations Cup in Egypt and didn’t quite disappoint.

Yet, we treat them like some dirty rags the moment someone in the football house in Abuja gets a brainwave about some funny foreign coach or technical adviser who may not necessarily add much value to our football but are, nonetheless, treated like kings because of the colour of their skin. Rather than develop and empower our coaches, by training and retraining them and giving them pay cheques that can make them compete favourably with what their foreign counterparts earn, we debase them with peanuts. Most of them don’t even have valid contracts with the NFA. That is why it is so easy for the soccer ruling body to owe them as much as nine months in salary arrears.

The question is: why is it so difficult for the NFA to empower our national coaches? Why do they take joy in making local coaches looking so beggarly before foreign-based players who earn dollars and expect the stars to respect and obey them? Imagine what happened to Chukwu in 2005 during the qualifying series of the last Nations Cup in Egypt? He went to Zimbabwe with nine players and by the day of the match, he had only 14, three of them goalkeepers. Which means he had only 11 players on the bench for the match. How do you explain such degrading nonchalance from players? It is because we don’t respect and empower our coaches. The earlier we reversed this ugly trend, the better things would turn for our football and the happier we shall all be. It’s time we respect and treat local coaches well.