Curb age-cheating in football

Lazarus Sauti

Age -cheating has bring disrepute to Africa football simply because African soccer players want to boost their market value by claiming to be years younger than they are. This cancer – age fraud – is triggered by many factors.

In most parts of Africa, footballers are paid meager salaries which are sometimes in arrears, so the dream to travel abroad to make ends meet drives them to do anything to make it possible.

Football players, it is believed, doctor their passport to lower their dates of birth and enhance their chances to attract lucrative deals with top clubs.

The mentality of African youthful teams to win competitions at all cost is another factor. The under 17 and under 20 tournaments are organised to help participating countries to groom players for the senior national teams in the ensuing years.

Instead of using these tournaments as platforms to groom future national team players, administrators connive with parents, football agents and footballers to alter date of births and boost chances to win at all costs.

This attitude of being so desirous to win the junior and youth tournaments has contributed to the underdevelopment of soccer in countries within and across the African continent.

Sports administrators should take the lion’s share of the blame for age fraud since they saddle their coaches with the burden to deliver and the coaches in turn believe they can cut every corner possible to get a result.

Africa is bedeviled with poor structures at the football academy level which has also not helped matters.

Unlike in Europe where academies are well structured and also benefit from a system which makes the tracking of ages easier, the story is far different in the African continent.

Television football analyst Calvin Emeka says: “There are no thriving school sports festivals and no thriving academies that take children within their right ages. So, it is almost impossible to bring out genuine players for the age-grade tournaments.”

Emeka goes on to say: “Reducing ages so as to get good contracts abroad is not a good enough excuse. In my view it is a pathetic one and one that should be swatted aside with the disdain it deserves.”

Sadly, age-cheating is intentional and parents and teams managers (who convince parents ‘doctor’ the age of players, in order to make the grade for an age-restricted team) are prime facilitators who are orchestrating this evil practice of age-cheating in the continent.

Peter Alegi, African Historian and Author of African Soccerscape: How a Continent change the World’s Game, remarks, “Almost everyone up and down the commodity chain is involved…from coaches and recruiters to family and the players themselves.”

On a damaging note, age-cheating has adverse effects on a player and country. It has not help most of the players to move to the next cadre of the national team and even at club level.

This is so because using over-age players for age group competitions is one of the major reasons why football has not fully developed in the African continent.

Since age-cheating is a cancer that seriously affects the development of football in countries within and across Africa, stakeholders in the football sector should strictly focus on curbing it.

Bheki Magwaza, who is part of the Provincial Executive Committee of the South Africa Schools Football Association, notes: “Team managers, school teachers and coaches should learn that they should not change the ages of players. What is killing our football is age cheating.

“We cannot change a player who is 17-years old and convert him into a 14-year old because in the long run it shows up somewhere. Maybe if we can try and rectify that, we will go a long way with our South African football.”

The penultimate way forward to eradicate age-cheating is by organising seminars for young players to enlighten their knowledge on the effects of age-cheating in football.

More so, journalists who dig deep in finding the truth in our modern football should not be subjected to all kinds of vilification, but rather commended.

Emeka says, “African journalists need to start exposing these things for the greater good of our national teams.”

The Confederation of African Football (CAF) issued a directive that all age group players must undergo Magnetic Resonance Imaging scans for the determination of the real age of players.

Accordingly, football authorities in Africa should religiously follow the directive if they are determined to see a progress in African football.

At the same time, Caf needs to be stricter on the ages of players before they even compete in world tournaments.

In the same vein, all football enthusiasts, parents, administrators, agents and teams should uphold Fifa’s maxim of the Fifa Fair Play code 5 which provides: “Football is the world’s greatest game…it always needs everybody’s help to maintain its greatness. Think of football’s interest before your own. Think how your actions may affect the image of the game.”

Africa has never fallen short of the production of very talented footballers who have all contributed in diverse ways in making the sport the most admirable worldwide.

However, the same continent has been the biggest culprit when it comes to what can be described as age fraud.