Give youth football more emphasis

By Omulo Okoth

Ask any casual observer the difference between football and athletics in Kenya and the answer you are most likely to get is that of success between the two.

Kenyan athletes are among the world’s best. While football is in a worrying state of mismanagement. For the last four years, this state of mismanagement has excercabated to new levels of farcical turf wars.

However, behind these differences of success lies another less recognised, nay appreciated, phenomenon: Activities at the junior/youth level of the disciplines which are poles apart.

While athletics is as busy at the youth/junior level as it is at the professional stage, thanks mainly to schools competitions running from districts to national stage, there has invariably been little activity at the same level in football, which is incidentally even more popular with the masses.

However star-studded Kenyan national athletics championships may be, many Kenyans would be reluctant to pay their way through the stadium turnstiles to watch athletics.

Multitude Of Fanatics

Such is not the case with football, which attracts multitude of fanatics, only recently affected by the runaway popularity of European leagues.

At the height of Kenyan’s dominance of regional football, it had just emerged from an intensive youth development programme, which was funded and managed by German donor agencies. This is why I commend Patrick Naggi, the FKL Technical Director, who has decided, after a lot of muck raking in the senior team’s selection recently, to direct his effort where it is most needed.

Youth Football

That Naggi has chosen to reawaken youth football is not only commendable but long overdue. This is where we shall get the future Oliechs, Marigas and Oboyas.

Mathare Youth Sports Association is a living testimony to what youth development can achieve. Why the better-funded national federation has not taken this area seriously and implemented it is as baffling as it is mind-boggling.

The Kenyan under-20 team recently finished runners-up in a tournament in Bahrain. They were fifth in South Africa during the continental tournament sponsored by soft drink giant, Coca Cola. They are now in Egypt taking part in a tournament, which is a dress rehearsal for the World Under-20 Championships in September. This is the way to get our future stars.

Cast your eyes across the continent. Nigeria’s 1996 Olympic Games winning team grew to dominate the West African nation’s national team and European leagues for years. The likes of Taribo West, Nwankwo Kanu, Augustine ‘Jay Jay’ Okocha, among others, were all products of that youth development side. Kenya’s team that won silver medal at the 1987 All African Games was dominated by the team that graduated from the German-funded programme.

So, I urge Naggi to spend as little time as possible with the senior team. It will only leave him with an egg on his face. We need your effort here most, because our future lies in the youth.

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David Okeyo has reportedly relinquished his position in National Olympic Committee (Nock). I hear this is for the sake of unity and harmony in Athletics Kenya (AK).

His election to Nock created a heated controversy at Riadha House because he did not seek his own association’s blessings. Worse, his own chairman Isaiah Kiplagat had his eyes on the same seat. But athletics is the Golden Goose of Kenya’s Olympics competition. What happens after Okeyo’s decision? Won’t athletics be represented in Nock? Will AK agree on a candidate to take its slot, to correct the alleged wrong for which Okeyo was accused of? If they agree on Kiplagat, will that much sought-after harmony stand?

And with due respect to Okeyo’s assistant, Ibrahim Hussein, who is also the deputy director of International Association of Athletics Federation (IAAF) Regional Development Centre for Anglophone Africa, how does he hope to serve other countries under his jurisdiction without stoking the perception of bias?

From a purely professional stand point, there is a challenge here. As, indeed, there are in officials serving in umbrella associations and their affiliates simultaneously.

The writer is The Standard Sports Editor

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