NFF ELECTION: AMAJU PINNICK TENURE COMES TO AN END TODAY

Amaju Pinnick will at present formally finish his eight years grip on the helm of affairs of the Nigeria Soccer Federation (NFF) as his board tenure lapses at present.

The Delta State-born sports activities administrator was first elected as NFF President in 2014 after successful an elective congress that was held in Asaba, Delta State Capital. He would later make historical past when he received his second time period bid in 2018, changing into the first-ever NFF president to be re-elected for a second time period in workplace.

Nevertheless, the stewardship account of the previous Chairman of Delta State Soccer Affiliation has raised divided opinions amongst soccer stakeholders.

Beneath his auspices, Nigeria received U-17 World Cup in 2015, clinched Ladies’s AFCON in 2016 and 2018, and scooped bronze medals on the 2016 Olympics and African Cup of Nations in 2019.

Nevertheless, stakeholders argue that within the 4 years of his predecessor, Aminu Maigari, as NFF president, Nigeria received 13 trophies, together with the all-important African Cup of Nations (AFCON), whereas Pinnick in eight years received solely three trophies, together with the one ready by Maigari earlier than he left workplace.

Additionally beneath his administration, Nigeria, for the primary time since 1974, did not qualify for back-to-back AFCONs.

The Ladies’s nationwide group didn’t fare any higher. There was a fast decline within the performances of the as soon as African giants which lastly resulted within the group having their worst event within the historical past of the Ladies’s African Cup of Nations (WAFCON) earlier this 12 months in Morocco.

The Falcons’ incapability to attend the final two Olympic Video games was among the many pattern of the downturn in Ladies’s soccer in Nigeria.

Pinnick has been accused of sacrificing Nigeria’s native soccer administration on the altar of his ambition to be a member of CAF and FIFA. Many imagine that Pinnick solely cared about his private growth moderately than the event of Nigerian soccer.

Others are of the opinion that the NFF beneath Pinnick had made super progress within the areas of securing profitable sponsorship offers for the nationwide groups, including that Pinnick, as an elective member of the CAF government committee and FIFA Council member, projected a great picture for Nigeria on the worldwide stage.

For some, if not most soccer fans in Nigeria, the native leagues, particularly the Nigeria Skilled Soccer League (NPFL) had been just about deserted and have become a shell of their wonderful previous. Gone had been the times when Nigerian golf equipment held their head excessive on the African stage and the organisation of the league grew to become a joke beneath Pinnick. The nation has did not qualify for back-to-back African Nations Championships (CHAN).

Love him or hate him, Pinnick would go down within the annals of Nigeria soccer historical past as a really vibrant, formidable, and controversial determine because the president of the NFF.

Efih will probably be anxiously desperate to make her Portuguese topflight debut for Braga after they prove towards CA Ouriense on Sunday.