FIFA World Cup (South Africa 2010) Euphoria, 'Reality or Sentiment'

The senior world cup as organized by FIFA (Federation of International Football Associations), is unarguably the biggest sporting event on planet earth. The reason being that the management of FIFA has been able to raise the popularity of this beloved round leather game to a height that is unprecedented in the history of sport. It has even become a political tool that the hitherto uninterested military and political world powers like the United States of America has now become a power to reckon with in modern days football. They even went a step further to popularize this great game by hosting the 1994 edition of the mundial. The US has added technology to football coaching and management.

Playing football between nations is just like going to war as some countries now use it either to settle political scores or show their sporting superiority. A case in hand is the incident that occurred during the qualifying rounds of the forth-coming South Africa 2010 FIFA World cup, between African champions Egypt and their perennial rivals Algeria, which led to a lot of off the field squabbles leaving many wounded and almost led to serious diplomatic face-off between the two nations.

A country like Nigeria came into lime-light after winning the 1996 Atlanta Olympic game soccer event. This single soccer goal eclipsed any other medals won by the Nigerian contingent to that year's Olympic games, regrettably though, Nigeria has not been able to make a major impact at the senior world cup; her best performance so far being a second round qualification at both the 1994 and 1998 editions, they however could not go beyond the first round in Korea/Japan 2002 and were not able to qualify for the 2006 edition in Germany as they were edged out by a less footballing nation like Angola. This actually shocked the world sending a signal to the so-called football world powers that there are no longer any minors in the world of football.

Among the 35 nations joining host South Africa for the first ever edition of the mun dial on African soil (Thanks to Sepp Blatter for his love for mother land Africa), there has been so much hype about which country is more favoured to lift the greatest, most prestigious silver ware in the world. Countries like Brazil, Argentina, Spain, Italy, England, Portugal are being taunted as possible winners by soccer pundits based on current form of their players plying their trade across the globe or past records. Although we all know that records don't play football. Some have even raised the hope of some African countries by speculating that this might just be the chance for an African country to lift this most coveted trophy.

As laughable as this might sound, some African football federation have begone to give their coaches some tall orders. For instance the newly hired Swedish born Nigeria's coach Lars Lagerback has been asked to take Nigeria to the semi final stage of the mundial. I don't know where they got this rare confidence from.

For the exponents of the possibility of an African country lifting the cup, they base their belief on the recent accomplishment of the Ghanaian under 20 team that set a new record by being the first African country to win at that stage of the competition and the accomplishments of some African countries including Nigeria at the youth level of football. They say, if Ghana could win at that stage, then why not at the senior level. What is not known by these exponents is the dearth of youth development programs in these countries to be able to sustain the various successes achieved at all the youth championships, sustainable programs must be put in place to build on the successes achieved.

I have chosen not to be a pessimist, but realities staring me in the face tells me that no African country has the administrative discipline nor technical properties to win the world cup, not in the next 20 years.

Come June 2010, book makers would be proved right or wrong as speculations would begin to pave way for realities. Dreams would be met and dreams would be dashed, but the euphoria of the FIFA world cup would linger on for as long as history could hold it.

My worries are these, amongst the 36 nations eyeing the the FIFA world cup in South Africa, how many countries have opened training camps, how many friendly matches are being played, how much does friendly matches determine the true strength of a team, how far can countries like Nigeria, Cameroon, Algeria, Ivory-Coast, Ghana and even host South Africa go in the competition. At the end of the mundial reality would definitely replace all the sentiments.

Do you have a different opinion? Please drop some comment here, let's talk about it.