My son and other young players abroad will rescue Nigeria football – Ikpe Ekong

Francis Achi, Abuja

With the decay of grassroot football in Nigeria, where football talents are gradually declining from the country, Ikpe Ekong, former Super Eagles player has said that his son and other young Nigerian players abroad will rescue Nigeria football frp, further decay, reports totorinews.com

Ekong, who was a member of the Super Eagles that featured at the 2004 Africa Nations Cup in Tunisia said that the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) must invest their resources to the development at the grassroot in Nigeria, as he stressed that the future of the game in the country lies in nurturing the massive football talents at the grassroot and failure to develop these players will only resort to Nigeria depending on young players born abroad, but of Nigerian heritage to rescue Nigeria football.

“The future of Nigeria football, we need to do something about the grassroot football in the country. This is very paramount, very essential and predominant. If we do not have any meaningful development of football at the grassroot, it will affect Nigeria football negatively. It is already affecting our football gradually.”

“Of course, may be those young players like my son (Emmanuel) and other players that have developed their football abroad, originally from Nigeria, but they are citizens of European countries that have been developed through football academies in Europe those are the young players that might as well come back to rescue Nigeria football,” he added.

“Players like Alex Iwobi, Williams Troost Ekong are already attesting to this. These are the set of players that can come and rescue Nigeria football. Otherwise, if we want to hope and put our emphasis on football players we have in Nigeria today, i bet you, Nigeria football will not go anywhere.

“We need to go back to the grassroot. If we do not fix our grassroot football, no way Nigeria football will be developed, except those players born abroad of Nigerian heritage decides to play for Nigeria and rescue our football,” he said.

Ekong’s son, 16 years old Emmanuel plays for Empoli in Italia Seria A.