Michael Emenalo, the director of football at the Saudi Pro League, was interviewed by the BBC’s Dan Roan for the programme “Inside the Saudi Sporting Machine”. What he said about the Saudi Pro League, that has recruited top football talent like Cristiano Ronaldo and Sadio Mane, as well as a world class football administrator like Emenalo, was even more revealing about Nigeria.
The former left-back for Enugu Rangers and Nigeria said “when you want to do something, you must have the ambition to do it well. That is the route the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has taken”. It is definitely not a route that Nigerians would recognise from either football authorities in the country or those in positions of power.
Nigeria is riddled with what is known in local parlance as “anyhowness”. It is a tendency to do things “anyhow”. Just go through the motions, no point aiming for excellence or perfection. This is because doing things well, such as running the national game in a professional manner, is not part of the agenda. As political economist Claude Ake put it: “The assumption so readily made that there has been a failure in development is misleading. The problem is not so much that development has failed as that it was never really on the agenda in the first place”.
In most aspects of public endeavour in Nigeria, the agenda is dominated by selfish interest. So there is little attempt to follow Emenalo’s Saudi doctrine of doing things well. Emenalo, after excelling as football director especially at Chelsea and now as the point-man tasked with transforming Saudi Arabia from the footballing backwaters into a major player in the world scene, is a huge example of Nigerians doing well individually abroad, while those talents are lost to the country and may not have been allowed to thrive in a climate of “anyhowness” and the associated corruption.
Nigeria’s loss is Saudi gain and Emenalo explained further that the kingdom’s goal is to “create a hugely competitive league for people around the world to tune in and watch”. The Nigerian Professional Football League can’t even get locals to watch their games. The Saudi Pro League spent about £1bn in the summer attracting talent from Europe’s major leagues. When asked whether the footballing world should expect a similar splurge of cash again, Emenalo replied that such spending won’t always be on players. “The aim is to enhance and improve the industry” with focus on infrastructure, amenities, athlete performance and so on.
With Emenalo at the helm, it is not improbable to envision Saudi Arabia becoming a footballing powerhouse by the time they host the World Cup in 2034, despite not having much of a footballing tradition in relative terms. While Nigeria, with its rich traditions in the game, continues to descend into mediocrity, thanks to the failure create a climate for the likes of Emenalo to thrive in service to their country.
