Benson Chukwueke addresses a crowd of football fans during "Popular Side Summit."
Held at Abramovic Sports Bar and Viewing Center Anthony Village –Lagos Nigeria.
The way football is consumed nowadays shows that the age-old sniffiness about supporting only one team has become obsolete, Benson Chukwueke declared
Football fans in Nigeria has evolved over the years based on socio-political, and technological disruptions resulting to globalization as well as rapid cultural changes.
In the 70s, to choose the team to support was often as a result of your place of birth or your native tribe. That’s why supporting more than one team were anathema to so many people then. For instance, the rivalry between Enugu Rangers and IICC shooting stars of Ibadan was based on tribal sentiments, an aftermath of disaffections of the Nigerian civil war extended into the field of play. Gordon Ebile called it "The battle of the tribes."
Indeed, it was seen as disloyalty of the highest order, if you being an Iboman, decided to support IICC Shooting stars of Ibadan, a Yoruba team. In fact, it was not heard of then. Only Ibo players can play for Rangers and Yourba players for IICC.
But as such disaffections melted away through the years of rebuilding nationhood in Nigeria, players began to move more freely across regions and such detribalized teams as Leventis United, NNB, Abiola Babies took center stage... brought top stars into their team, irrespective of the players tribe. The teams even extended their lure to players from neighboring countries like Ghana, Cameroon, Cote D'Ivoire, Benin Republic...
So Fans became detribalized also and began to support teams across region solely based on the quality of their game and the stars they possess. Then, it was all about supporting teams in the domestic league. Stadium were filled to capacity in most national division 1 games and nobody followed nor supported any foreign club.
Globalization of the Modern World
The idea of making the earth a global village began to take toll through the commercialization of satellite technology and a more relax immigration policies. Fans can watch on television more sophisticated football leagues from Europe and South America right from their homes. Gradually, fans began to show some kind of affinity for these leagues abroad. It began to feature in some elitist discussions and soon burst out of the local media programming.
Moreover, some Nigerian players like Stephen Keshi, Rashidi Yekini, Peter Rufai... found their way abroad and started featuring for teams in Beliguim, Portugal, Spain and England. That greatly spurs the interest of the local fans to support foreign teams that has players of Nigerian descents.
Nwankwo Kanu fame in Arsenal; Celestine Babayro performances in Chelsea began a new phase for Nigerian fans supporting these teams in the English Premier League. No thanks to the globalisation of the Premier League, the domestic Nigeria professional football league (NPFL) became greatly submerged.
How We Consume Football Today
With the availability of Pay tv to more households and investors found sports bar and viewing center a profitable business to operate all across the country; fans began to follow several european leagues such as Laliga, Bundesliga, Seria A, Ligue 1 and as a result support more than one team across board. Fans that support Arsenal in the premier league, can also support Barcelona in Laliga. Fans that support Chelsea can also support Bayern Munich in the Bundesliga...
With the Internet social media and mobile technology available to all, football contents are consumed more rapidly on real time, more interactive and more connected with teams around the world, almost make in impossible to absolutely support one team without having some kind of soft spot or some kind of affinity with another team elsewhere.
How we consume football nawadays makes it absolutely fine to support more than one team. At club level, I support Barcelona in Laliga, Arsenal in Premier league and Enyimba in NPFL and at national team level, I support Nigeria and the Brazilian national team. That's because I love to watch teams that play free flowing football style. Teams that take possession of the ball, throwing thru passes, dribbles and sometimes, playing to the gallery. What I call Champagne football.
What Common Sense Should Tell You
According to Ben Murray Bruce, No matter what inspires you to support a set of different teams, common sense should tell you to at least support one team from the Nigerian league. That's what I term as patriotism and delibrate involvement in growing the football industry here in Nigeria.
Nobody should arbitrarily collect teams like trading cards, but supporting more than one can give you a greater appreciation for the sport’s universality. And, most importantly, more teams means more reasons to watch more football. For that reason alone, having more than one team isn’t just absolutely fine… it’s highly recommended!
