RandaFooty: Everything Nigerian football, home and abroad

Glo Premier League defending champions, Kano Pillars on Wednesday, March 26 became the first Club to comply with the Nigeria Professional Football League 2013/14 registration requirement of providing a financial performance guarantee. The Club in a letter to the League Management Company (LMC) attached a Performance Guarantee for N25 million (N25, 000, 000) from a Fidelity Bank Plc, Kano Branch with reference number FB/007/OBG/0314/1034 and dated March 17, 2014. The performance guarantee represents the first tranch of the quarterly guarantee of the total N100m that Clubs are required to provide under the season's licensing requirements. "We demanded the performance guarantee from clubs as evidence of their capacity to meet financial obligations to playing staff, other employees and vendors. It will eliminate the scourge of accumulated indebtedness especially to players by clubs", LMC Chairman, Hon. Nduka Irabor had explained at the introducti

This year's Federation Cup competition will kick off with the State preliminaries on Saturday, 5th April, according to a release from NFF's Head of Federation Cup, Miss Ruth David. The State finals are scheduled for Sunday, 4th May across the federation, while the play-off matches will be played over the days of 14th and 15th May. The Draw for the National finals will hold in Abuja on 29th May. Miss David also warned that deadline for submission of 2014 Federation Cup licenses remains Monday, 31st March. "Late submission of licensesis allowed from 1st April - 11th April, 2014 and will attract a fine of N300,000 (Three Hundred Thousand Naira Only) by the defaulting club(s)," she explained.

Kelechi Iheanacho and Isaac Success have been named in a 35-man provisional squad expected to reconvene on Sunday ahead of a 2015 African Youth Championship qualifier. Iheanacho is on the books of Manchester City, while Success has just recently teamed up with Granada CF in Spain. Several other overseas-based players including Musa Muhammed (Besiktas,Turkey), Chidiebere Nwakali (Manchester City, England), Chidera Eze (FC Porto, Portugal), Musa Yahaya (Celta Vigo, Spain) and Sunday Alampasu, who is undergoing trials in Belgium, are also picked. The squad is made up of the bulk of the 2013 FIFA U17 World Cup-winning squad.

World Cup Under-17 Champions, Golden Eaglets of Nigeria are on the march again as the screening of new players that would defend the title won last year in the United Arab Emirates begins in Abuja on Thursday. The Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) has finalized arrangement for the smooth take off of the usual gruelling exercise at the practice pitch of the NFF/FIFA Goal Project Site.

pic courtesy bigsoccer.com Former Nigeria international midfielder Moses Kpakor has emphatically stated that the Super Eagles of Nigeria will have a decent outing at the 2014 Fifa World Cup in June. Kpakor, who spoke exclusively to 9jafooty, is of the opinion that a lot of things that usually hamper Nigeria's progress at various World Cups are being taken care of before the tournament starts. The diminutive midfielder, who made his name with the defunct BCC Lions of Gboko, is optimistic Nigeria will finally win a group game since the last win at France in 1998. "I'm sure we will do better than the previous two editions we attended when we failed to win any group game. The setting makes me feel the hoodoo will be broken," Kpakor enthused. "Keshi has been able to instill that self belief and confidence in the squad and we should also remember we are heading to Brazil as African Champions, that should surely count for something. "I believe the b

Eagles . Pic courtesy adidas.com The recent friendly game with the El Tri of Mexico at the Georgia Dome had a lot of pointers to how Nigeria might strategise for games and also showed a glimpse of what to expect from the Super Eagles at the World Cup in June. Keshi, a proponent of the 4-3-3 system, surprised a lot of fans and pundits alike when he went with a rather unorthodox 4-4-1-1 formation. Line up v Mexico . Illustration via Andrew Randa Whether this was to counter the 5-3-2 set up by Mexico coach Miguel Hererra, so as not to lose the midfield, or was some sort of experimentation, the 'Big Boss' showed he is willing to have a plan B in case the usual formation becomes vain. Suffice to say, the 4-4-1-1 was a bit deceptive because it morphed into a 4-5-1 on a number of occasions during the match as Michael Uchebo was to play just behind Emmanuel Emenike, dropped into the midfield and was clogging up the spaces in the midfield which disrupte

pic courtesy telegraph.co.uk  Nigeria and Olympiakos midfielder, Michael Olaitan, is in stable condition in hospital after he collapsed on the field of play in the 35th minute during the Athens derby between his team and Panathinaikos in the Greek Super League. Olaitan, 20, fell down without any contact at the Karaiskakia Stadium was quickly attended to before he was whisked to the Metropolitan hospital for further tests.

Nigeria youth internationals Kingsley Madu and Moses 'Daddy' Ajala got off their European career to a great start as they helped FK AS Trecin beat MSK Zilina in the Corgon Liga in Slovakia.  The youngsters, who were part of the Nigerian team that lost out to Uruguay in the second round of the 2013 World Youth Championship held in Turkey, made the move to the Slovakian side during the winter transfer window.