Nigeria Should Rebuild Women's Football From The Grassroots, Says Omidiran
Lagos · Sunday 23 August 2026
Nigeria must return to the grassroots to rebuild women's football, according to Omidiran. The diagnosis is right. The timing makes it very hard to act on.
What the Falcons actually lost
Nigeria went out of WAFCON to Cameroon and with it went the automatic place at the 2027 Women's World Cup in Brazil. Qualification now runs through an intercontinental playoff route, which is a considerably harder path and a much less certain one.
The Super Falcons are the most successful national team Nigeria has ever had, in either gender, by a wide margin. They have been run for a decade on goodwill, delayed bonuses and periodic public disputes about money.
Why grassroots is the right answer and the hardest one
Because it is the only intervention that compounds, and because it produces nothing visible for six or seven years. A federation under pressure to show results before the next election of its own officers has every incentive to spend on the senior team instead.
| Spend | Visible in | Compounds |
|---|---|---|
| Senior team camp and bonuses | Weeks | No |
| Coach change | One tournament | No |
| School and community programmes | Six to eight years | Yes |
Why the correct answer keeps losing to the urgent one.
The money question sits underneath all of it
The EFCC and ICPC are both examining a N12 billion federal intervention fund released to the NFF for player wages and bonuses. The Senate has summoned the federation and the National Sports Commission over both national teams.
Until it is clear how money moves between the government, the federation and the players, no grassroots plan is safe. The women's programme has historically absorbed the shortfall whenever the men's programme overran, and a shared pool under pressure always behaves that way.
Separate budget lines with separate reporting would do more for Nigerian women's football than any amount of agreement about grassroots.
Reporting: Complete Sports, Vanguard and Premium Times.
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