Playing football on killer artificial turfs

The Eagles have had to criss-cross the country, playing in different cities with no place that can be called the home of the team.

The Eagles have had to play in Abuja, Calabar, Kaduna, Port Harcourt and, of late, the Nest of

Champions in Uyo, which is unarguably the best arena in the country today.

While the Eagles are making nomadic trips round the country, other great football-playing nations have permanent venues, where their national teams play.

Our West African neighbour, Republic of Benin, has the Stade de Lamite in Cotonou, where the Squirrels play. Ghana has the ever-ready Ohene Djan Stadium in Accra, although the Ghanaians sometimes move their games to the Baba Yara Stadium in Kumasi, when they want to further exploit home advantage.

Up North, the Cairo International Stadium in Egypt is the fortress of the Pharaohs. South Africa has the FNB Stadium in Jo’burg, where the final of the South Africa 2010 World Cup was decided.

Outside Africa, the Three Lions of England has the famous Wembley Stadium in London as home. What Wembley is to England is what the equally famous Maracana Stadium is to Brazil. One can go on and on to name the soccer cathedrals of different countries.

In Nigeria, the Abuja National Stadium, which is supposed to be the new soccer shrine of the country has been reduced to a grazing ground, which can only host the game of Polo. The arena, which the country used several billions of naira to construct in 2003 for the COJA 2003 All-Africa games, has since been abandoned like the National Stadium in Surulere, Lagos. The only events that now take place daily at the Surulere stadium are isi-ewu and beer-drinking competitions. The drinking joints that dot the stadium are of course the “match venues.”

While the Federal Government-owned national stadia in Abuja and Lagos rot away, various state governments are pumping millions of naira to  “upgrade” the stadia in their domains by replacing the natural grass pitches with artificial turfs, which on television appear very nice.

From Lagos to Kano, down to Enugu, Benin, Ijebu-Ode, Bauchi, Gombe, Makurdi, Katsina and Port Harcourt, the story is the same. Interestingly, despite burning (yes, burning) the millions, virtually none of the arenas can host Super Eagles games.

How come, in spite of having “fine pitches” in all these cities mentioned above, the Eagles still remain, so to speak, homeless?

While the Eagles are homeless, all the clubs featuring in the nation’s domestic scene do not have the problem of where to play. In another two weeks, precisely, on January 14, the nation’s premier league, the NPFL 2018 season, would get underway. The draw was made last week in Kano after the LMC-organised Super Six invitational, which the Morocco-bound CHAN Eagles won.

Going by the Week One pairings, defending champions, Plateau United, would begin their campaign away to Nasarawa United at the Lafia Stadium. Aiteo Cup kings, Akwa United, would be home to Rangers in the star match of the league opener at the Uyo Nest of Champions.

However, unknown to many of the players and coaches, they are plying their trade on killer pitches, which is the real reason foreign-based Super Eagles’ players dread such turfs like the plague.

Daily Sunsports investigations revealed that Super Eagles players, plying their soccer trade in Europe and other parts of the world made it clear to the nation’s soccer governing body, the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF), that they would not risk life and limb playing on the substandard artificial turfs in the country.

Investigations further revealed that it is easy to get career-threatening injuries on the “China made” brand of artificial turfs in the country. As if that is not enough, experts have revealed that the kind of artificial turfs that dot the country are killer brands that could expose the players and coaches to the dreaded cancer disease because of their toxic nature.

We gathered that the substandard artificial turfs that are being installed in various stadia across the country are rubber products that get heated up to dangerous levels during afternoon games.

Our source further disclosed that the artificial turfs in most of the stadia in Nigeria today are first generation synthetic pitches (1960 and early ’70s technology), which have since been phased out in Europe and other parts of the world, thanks to scientific research findings that proved they were dangerous to the health of players.

Our source, a medical doctor, said this writer should go and google the health implications of playing on first-generation rubber turfs.

“What our players do week in, week out is play on rubber. Those who award the contracts do not care. All they are interested in is lining their pockets. What is happening right now in pitch construction in the country is a big scam that needs to be checked,” he said.

A five-year study comparing artificial turf to grass for football injuries, published in 2004 in the American Journal of Sports Medicine, concluded that there were 15.2 injuries per 10 games played on artificial turf to 13.8 injuries per 10 games played on grass.

When confronted with this fact by Daily Sunsports, a sports facility and stadium construction expert, Ebi Egbe, the CEO of Monimichelle, explained that the problem was not artificial turf per se but the quality of artificial turfs in the country. He argued that FIFA approves matches to be played on artificial turfs that are constructed in such a way that does not harm the players, health-wise.

“I agree that there is a problem in the country with most of the artificial pitches and that problem is that of quality. Most of the artificial turfs we have in Nigeria are nothing but pure rubber. Of course, that is why Eagles can’t play in Kano, Enugu, Port Harcourt, name it.”

Egbe stressed that his company, Monimichelle, does not touch the “rubber synthetic turfs.”

He said: “We don’t construct rubber synthetic turf. I don’t touch it because I know the health implications for the players. As a FIFA match agent, I also know FIFA won’t endorse her matches to be played on such turfs. What my company does is geo-technology pitches that are constructed with coconut fibre and cork. The ball behaviour on such a pitch is the same with that of natural grass. It is a technology that passed FIFA tests because the world soccer governing body values the health of players. Pitches that are constructed with coconut fibre and cork are as cool as that of natural grass on a sunny day. But go and feel the turf in Enugu, Ibadan, Lagos and Kano in the afternoon before a match, then you will know that our home-based players are playing under a hellish atmosphere.”

Egbe stressed that his outfit was at the moment constructing two pitches in Yenagoa and Aba. He insisted that, when completed, even the Super Eagles won’t say they can’t play there: “What we are doing at the Samson Siasia Stadium and the Enyimba Stadium in Aba are geo-tech pitches. I can put my money on the fact that the NFF can take Eagles games there without the players raising an eyebrow. The only challenge the stadia would face is that of the capacity and not the turf.”

Ex-international, Waidi Akanni, who bared his mind on the nature of synthetic pitches in the country, equally raised the alarm, insisting that the lives of the present generation of home-based players were being endangered. He said the “shine shine” synthetic pitches in the country do not meet international standards, even as he called on the various state governments to stop constructing pitches that could only ruin the life of players.