Government not helping grassroots sports development — Anambra Lawmaker

Charles Ezeani, representing Anaocha II constituency in Anambra House of Assembly on Saturday said that governments in the country had not helped in nurturing talents discovered from grassroots sports development programmes.
Ezeani made the assertion in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) at the football trials organised by U.K.-based Diamond Sports Academy at Teslim Balogun Stadium, Surulere Lagos.
NAN reports that Diamond Sports Academy in partnership with Ezeani Sports Academy, Nneni, conducted the football trials in Lagos to scout for young talented players and provide them the platform to play abroad.
The one week football trials which ended on Friday, had over 200 young footballers from across the country who were given the opportunity to showcase their talents.
On grassroots football in Nigeria, Ezeani, who is the Anambra State House of Assembly Minority Whip, said that government’s intervention through the provision of infrastructure could help sports to grow.
“Grassroots football development in Nigeria is still poor in the sense that one would have expected that government should help in putting up infrastructure.
“This structures will help give the young ones to have proper training. From my area Anambra State; one will shed tears on seeing the training pitches, there are no structures at all.
“The fields are so poor with stones everywhere and all sorts of things. But if government as expected had put up sports infrastructures, it will encourage many young footballers.
“Many upcoming talents have nowhere to train and those who want to scout for budding players are often discouraged but the talents are there,’’ he said.
Ezeani said that many talented footballers are being wasted because there was nothing for them to train with, adding that youths had not felt the impact of government.
“When you are in an environment and there is no facility to start up, how do you measure up? In my own case, I have to train the footballers in my own compound.
“When talking about grassroots sports development, we don’t mean the cities but football fields in the rural areas and communities.
“At times, also, in my father’s compound we train and when you train people under such uncomfortable atmosphere you cannot get the best out of them.
“To scout for players, we need good fields; this will go a long way and I know that providing sports infrastructure is not too expensive for the government,’’ he said.
The lawmaker, who is also the proprietor of Ezeani Football Academy in Nneni, Anaocha, Anambra, said that the players from his academy had issues playing on the synthetic pitch because had yet to play on it.
“Take for instance; my players had much problem because they have yet to play on synthetic pitch. It is new entirely. It is their first time and they don’t understand the pitch.
“On this, the youths must feel the impact of the government. Government should provide infrastructure; we are talking about providing pitches for training and not street football.
“We can lay claim that we have talented players, but they can never be developed under the present condition,’’ he said.
Ezeani commended the Lagos State Government for constructing Teslim Balogun Stadium but added that other state governments should also take a cue from Lagos template.
“Teslim Balogun is good. Also, other states should borrow a leaf from Lagos in providing sports fields.
“I believe that they have the capacity to provide such infrastructure but they don’t have the will.
“Provision of infrastructure is a platform for the players to develop, and this will save government the headache of having to police youths all about once they are well engaged.
“Youths can be pulled out of the streets through sports. Government invests much in hardware and software for the military to combat crime, why not channel a little to the provision of sports facilities,’’ he said.