International Football
Flashback: Eye witness account with PHOTOS: How Okwaraji, five fans died on this day 33 years ago
BY KUNLE SOLAJA.
This Thursday marks the33rd anniversary of the most celebrated on-field death in Nigerian football. The August 12, 1989 Italia ’90 World Cup qualifying match with Angola could had just been another match day. But it is now ever recalled, not for the result, which was favourable to Nigeria at least in the short run, but for the bizarre happenings.
It was just a day to the 10th anniversary of a previous disaster that claimed 24 lives at the National Stadium, Lagos.
Nigeria desperately needed to win the tie against Angola to be in contention of leading a World Cup qualifying group that also had Gabon and Cameroon.
The result of the penultimate match in Gabon which Nigeria against form books had lost 1-2 made the August 12, 1989 match the more important.
Besides, it was to be the first match after a long closure of the National Stadium, Lagos which was undergoing upgrading for an anticipated hosting of the then World Youth Championship (now u-20 World Cup) in 1991.
Nigeria had had to play their home matches at the low-capacity Lekan Salami Stadium, Ibadan until the National Stadium, Lagos was reopened.
Expectedly, the stadium was jam-packed for a teeming crowd that appeared to have been starved for close to two years that the stadium had been closed for refurbishment.
The crowd thronged the 40,000 capacity stadium, filling it nearly 20,000 over. About 4,000 others were stranded outside, making rounds to the 12 ramps leading into the main- bowl.
Announcements blared from the public address system directing the crowd outside to gates D, E and F leading to the southern pavilion at the Lagos end of the field. Gates had been opened nearly seven hours to kick off.
The spectators’ stands were overfilled, resulting in jostling and pushing, chokes, suffocation, exhaustion and soon, deaths! Moments before kick-off, some of the spectators around the covered terraces began to faint in ones and twos.
Few people might have noticed the unusual incident of an ambulance moving on the just refurbished tartan tracks to convey the fainted fans after efforts at reviving them by medical personnel had failed.
Then another ambulance came again. Ambulance movements became a common sight. The stadium’s clinic with only three beds became jam-packed with unconscious people.
Medical personnel said there were so many of them and they had to be treated on the bare floor. Fifteen of them had to be taken to the General Hospital in Lagos.
One Mutiu Salami, a 14-year old victim who was rushed to the General Hospital and regained consciousness three days later narrated his experience: “As the match drew to an end, everybody was rushing. They rushed me and I fell down. The next thing I knew was finding myself at the hospital”.
He was lucky. It was more disastrous for others. Five of them died. Niyi Mosuro, a 15- year-old schoolboy from Ijebu-Ode was one of the victims identified. August 12, 1989, was the first time he would watch a football match at the National Stadium.
It was the last day he lived. Wale Mosuro, his uncle, said Niyi was not quite a football enthusiast. His body was discovered in the morgue. Others identified were bodies of Shehu Tijani and Okorie Agwu.
Everything went awry that sunny August 12, 1989. Sad incidents that would catch worldwide attention were unfolding. From the sidelines, five football fans were suffocated to death. Football, a national passion, overnight turned a national horror.
The standard of soccer in the Nigeria-Angola match fell below expectation even though both teams paraded a pack of tested professionals. Tackling was rough. Each side lost a penalty kick. Austin Eguavoen lost that of Nigeria.
But the biggest disaster of the day was imminent. As the drab match progressed, an Angolan player slumped.
Medical personnel rushed to administer treatment. It was barely 10 minutes to the end of the match. As attention focussed on the injured player, and while some fans that had fainted by the sidelines were being attended to, the unexpected happened.
Dreadlocks haired Samuel Okwaraji, the Nigerian bubbling mid-field maestro, collapsed and fell face down. Few people would have thought it was mere exhaustion.
The nearest player to Samuel Okwaraji, Samson Siasia, rushed to the prostrate form and tried him to face up. What he saw was frightening as he put his hands on his head in despair.
“The way I saw him, he was gasping and foaming. His teeth were gritty… No one could easily ascertain the cause of his death. It still remains a mystery.
International Football
Former Brazil coach Tite taking break to take care of mental, physical health
Former Brazil coach Tite said he is taking an indefinite career break in order to take care of his mental and physical health.
The 63-year-old, who led Brazil to the 2019 Copa America title, was hospitalised due to a heart issue last August. He was sacked by Flamengo the following month and had most recently been linked with the Corinthians job.
“I realised that there are times when you have to understand that, as a human being, I can be vulnerable and admitting that will certainly make me stronger,” Tite said in a statement posted on his son Matheus Bachi’s Instagram on Tuesday.
“I’m passionate about what I do and I’ll continue to be so, but after talking to my family and observing the signals my body was giving off, I decided that the best thing to do now is to take a break from my career to look after myself for as long as it takes.
“As has become public, there was a conversation in progress with Corinthians, but it will have to be paralysed by a difficult but necessary decision.”
Tite, who stepped down as Brazil coach after their quarter-final exit from the 2022 World Cup, has previously coached a string of Brazilian sides including Gremio, Atletico Mineiro and Palmeiras.
-Reuters
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Brazil have sacked head coach Dorival Jr, the country’s football confederation (CBF) said on Friday after the five-time world champions were thrashed 4-1 away to fierce rivals Argentina in a humiliating qualifying loss in Buenos Aires.
The 62-year-old was appointed in January 2024 after the team spent a year under two caretaker coaches as the Brazilian FA were unable to lure Italian Carlo Ancelotti from Real Madrid.
“The Brazilian Football Confederation informs that coach Dorival Jr is no longer in charge of the Brazilian national team,” the confederation said in a statement.
“The management thanks (Dorival) and wishes him success in continuing his career … the CBF will work to find his replacement,” it added.
Dorival was handed the job after his success with Flamengo in 2022 where he won the Copa Libertadores and Brazilian Cup, a trophy he lifted again the next year with Sao Paulo.
However, he never seemed to get to grips with the national team job and failed to earn the trust of Brazil’s demanding fans after winning only seven of his 16 games in charge.
Sources told Reuters the CBF was not confident in Dorival’s work, considering there had been little to no progress since a lacklustre Copa America campaign when Brazil were knocked out in the quarter-finals by Uruguay last year.
Still, the CBF was willing to wait and see until the 2026 World Cup qualifiers against Ecuador and Paraguay in June to reassess the situation following the end of the European season and the Club World Cup in the U.S. in June and July.
But after Brazil slumped to their heaviest-ever loss in a qualifier when they were thrashed by Argentina this week, CBF president Ednaldo Rodrigues decided to pull the trigger.
IDEAL CANDIDATE
Sources told Reuters Ancelotti was still the ideal candidate but he is under contract with Real until July 2026 and there is no indication he would leave the European and Spanish champions.
Brazilian media have reported that Al Hilal’s Portuguese coach Jorge Jesus is the favourite to replace Dorival.
Brazil have been in unfamiliar territory for over two years since crashing out of the 2022 World Cup against Croatia on penalties in the quarter-finals, a heartbreaking elimination that led to the exit of long-time manager Tite.
Their humbling defeat in Buenos Aires was the latest of a series of negative records Brazil have set under caretakers Ramon Menezes and Fernando Diniz and with Dorival in charge. They had never conceded four goals in a World Cup qualifier.
Brazil are in the midst of their worst-ever World Cup qualifying campaign. They are fourth in the South American standings with 21 points, a point above sixth-placed Colombia who currently occupy the final direct qualifying berth.
Never have Brazil lost so many games, conceded so many goals or set so many negative records in the qualifying competition. They have lost five of their 14 games and conceded 16 goals.
Brazil’s 1-0 defeat by Argentina in the Maracana late in 2023 was their first-ever qualifying loss on home soil.
They also lost to Colombia for the first time, saw the end of their unbeaten run against Uruguay stretching back over two decades and were defeated by Morocco and Senegal, having never previously lost to an African nation.
-Reuters
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International Football
England’s German manager Tuchel will not sing the English anthem in his first game
England manager Thomas Tuchel said he would have to “earn the right” to sing the national anthem, God Save the King, after announcing his 26-man squad on Friday ahead of the team’s World Cup qualifiers.
Tuchel, who was appointed as Gareth Southgate’s successor in October and named his first squad to face Albania and Latvia this month, said he would not sing the anthem in his first games in charge.
“It means a lot to me, I can assure you, but I can feel that because it is so meaningful and it is so emotional and it is so powerful, the national anthem, that I have to earn my right to sing it,” the 51-year-old German told a news conference.
Former caretaker manager Lee Carsley was criticised last year for not singing the anthem during his tenure.
However, Tuchel added that while he is proud to be in charge of the team and knows the words to the anthem, he plans to earn the right with results.
“Maybe I have to dive more into the culture and earn my right from you, from the players, from the supporters, so everyone feels like ‘he should sing it now, he’s one of our own, he’s the English manager, he should sing it’,” he said.
-Reuters
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