Football Academy is taking over Street football by Kunle Adegunoye
Street football is gradually losing its appeal. Football Academy ti take over.
Seeing passionate, emotional contact football game played out by young boys around Oyingbo market, Ebute metta opposite First Bank in a not so sunny Saturday morning is enough to reminisce growing up in the humble village of Ilutitun Osooro, Ondo South.
From frontage of Marcopolo's house to Akindayomi's, one cannot but take to Street at the sight of soccer laced with romance. From the "moki" post to the "umpires" waiting for their turn, a career in soccer became a dream.
We played and played often forgetting about house chores. Mum's scolding, igbaju, igbarun, abara and sometimes pinching and dragging of ear will only work for that day. The next day, football continues!!!!
That was the world we grew up in,
A world away from glitz and glamour.
While Kanu Nwankwo, Carlos Tevez, Wayne Rooney, Iheanacho, Robinho, Alexis Sanchez, Luka Modric, Neymar, Ibrahimovic, Suarez, Ribery and Cristiano Ronaldo dreams of yesterday became today's reality, Kunle and his bandwidth of street friend's careers took another lane.
It was what made us men. The graduation from boys to men would be incomplete without those moments. Those moments not captured on cameras. Those moments not cheered by a 40,000 filled capacity stadium. Those moments where the players double as the referee. Tough moments but also beautiful.
Academy players might argue that Street footballers are somewhat directionless. Maybe they are right. We didn't play to be rewarded. We didn't play for local bragging right. We never attended any screening neither did we invite scouts to watch us play. We only played for the love of it.
From leaving our various primary and secondary schools in the afternoon to playing shirtless and bootless on the street, growing up could not have had more fun.
Yes, we might not have had our dreams fulfilled like Ronaldo, Neymar, Iheanacho, Adeniyi, Gbolahan Salami, Sanchez and Ribery but we can both lay claim to "the fact of life" that street made us.
Kunle Adegunoye writes from Oyingbo, Lagos.
Seeing passionate, emotional contact football game played out by young boys around Oyingbo market, Ebute metta opposite First Bank in a not so sunny Saturday morning is enough to reminisce growing up in the humble village of Ilutitun Osooro, Ondo South.
From frontage of Marcopolo's house to Akindayomi's, one cannot but take to Street at the sight of soccer laced with romance. From the "moki" post to the "umpires" waiting for their turn, a career in soccer became a dream.
We played and played often forgetting about house chores. Mum's scolding, igbaju, igbarun, abara and sometimes pinching and dragging of ear will only work for that day. The next day, football continues!!!!
That was the world we grew up in,
A world away from glitz and glamour.
While Kanu Nwankwo, Carlos Tevez, Wayne Rooney, Iheanacho, Robinho, Alexis Sanchez, Luka Modric, Neymar, Ibrahimovic, Suarez, Ribery and Cristiano Ronaldo dreams of yesterday became today's reality, Kunle and his bandwidth of street friend's careers took another lane.
It was what made us men. The graduation from boys to men would be incomplete without those moments. Those moments not captured on cameras. Those moments not cheered by a 40,000 filled capacity stadium. Those moments where the players double as the referee. Tough moments but also beautiful.
Academy players might argue that Street footballers are somewhat directionless. Maybe they are right. We didn't play to be rewarded. We didn't play for local bragging right. We never attended any screening neither did we invite scouts to watch us play. We only played for the love of it.
From leaving our various primary and secondary schools in the afternoon to playing shirtless and bootless on the street, growing up could not have had more fun.
Yes, we might not have had our dreams fulfilled like Ronaldo, Neymar, Iheanacho, Adeniyi, Gbolahan Salami, Sanchez and Ribery but we can both lay claim to "the fact of life" that street made us.
Kunle Adegunoye writes from Oyingbo, Lagos.
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