Coach of the national U-23 team, Samson Siasia, has said that age falsification by young players has cast a negative image on the development of football in the country.
Speaking at the closing ceremony of Charles Ezeani/SIA One Football Empowerment Competition for youths of Anaocha Constituency Two, in Neni, Anambra State on Monday, Siasia said that those who falsified their age to play for certain categories were causing harm to football development.
He said that grassroots competitions held the future for Nigerian football as budding talents could be discovered and nurtured to stardom.
The Africa U-23 gold wining coach said he was particularly happy with the performance of the female team at the competition and promised to provide the platform to help their career development.
He said it would amount to self deceit if Nigeria continued to conquer the world with age cheats who tire out when expected to be at their peak.
“I am very happy with your performances here; you show great potentials and I will like the very promising ones to come to Abuja where we can invite the NFA to watch you play.
“For the female team, you are wonderful and some of you can be recommended for the national team.
“As for the male team, I think this over-age thing is killing us; we do not want to do this over age thing anymore and we will try to catch them young to make sure that they play for a long time on the pitch.
“We will see them through but we must do the right thing.
“In Europe, they still doubt the age of our players. When they are discovered at a very young age and mentored through the stages, they will not need to change their age anymore and together we can make it happen,’’ he said.
The competition was organised by Charles Ezeani, representing Anaocha Constituency Two in the Anambra assembly, in conjunction with SIA One Academy, Abuja as part of empowerment programme for youths in his constituency.
The tournament featured male and female teams from Aguluzigbo, Nri, Neni, Ichida, Obeledu and Akweze.
The Aguluzigbo male team defeated their Nri counterpart 4-3 on penalties after the match ended in a 1-1 draw to win the cup and a cash prize of N150,000.
Neni girls walloped their Akweze opponents 2-0 to win the female category and lift the cup with the cash prize of N150,000.
Both teams that came second in the male and female categories went home with cash prizes of N100,000 and N50,000 respectively.
