The First World Cup football I can avidly remember watching was the 1994 world cup. Nigeria had a strong team, we were in the fifth position in the FIFA ranking of April 1994.
We had Rashidi Yekini, Stephen Keshi, Samson Siasia.
I watched the game avidly with my eyes on the ball, of course, I played football as a child.
I knew the basic rules of the game, don't touch the ball with your hands and make sure the ball doesn't go over the post.
When I stopped playing, I was contented with watching the game. In 1994, I knew the backstory of the football. I spend minutes poring to my father's complete football magazines.
I knew everything about the Nigerian footballers.
Watching Football and writing have the same requirements, you need to be able to see and you need to know the rules. In writing you can break the rules, in football, you get a red card or a yellow card.
In writing each work comes with its own handicap for every work you have to face the agony of creation, emotional high and low, obsession, self-awareness and in football they have to face physical fitness, the risk of getting injured, rivalry, being allowed to play and fatigue.
The football field has the form of a large rectangle covered with grass. We have a team of goalkeepers, defenders, midfielders, forwards and the coach.
Writing requires having talent, language, imagination, observation, thinking, risk-taking and hard work and good luck.
Football requires talent, hard work good luck and sometimes risk-taking.
Watching football, you literally follow the ball, your eyes should be laser sharp and you shouldn't be biased.
This year backstory started with Putin saying no World Cup without Messi.
Taking us back to the Ronaldo Messi rival. Ronaldo came and scored 3-3 against. The last goal he scored was a hat trick and he carved his place in world cup history.
Messi came and scored a goal. Then the rivalry between the fans across the world heats up. Who's the best? The backstory adds more layer and fun to the World Cup.
The Saudi Prince, saw his team lose to Putin's Russia, they're both friends and dictators.
We watched Suarez play and watch the field around him, after biting someone in the last World Cup and writing a book about it, he became a nice human and scored a goal against Iran.
Iran came to the World Cup with their Nike Jersey. Suddenly, they were told they couldn't wear their clothes. They had to buy Adidas and they played the game with their numbers falling because Nike was trolling from the USA. They couldn't make it to the World Cup but they can bully a team.
Even worse they're bullying immigrants by seizing their children, they've done the same thing to Native Americans and have incarcerated Japanese Americans in camps.
Japan won their match and their fans cleaned the stadium. Senegal scored a match with their only black coach and did the African Continent proud by cleaning the stadium.
Egypt couldn't win the match on the back of Salah, and Morrocco lost to Portugal.
Nigerians lose an own goal and a goal to Croatia and our Senate President visits the Russian Parliament. In a fictional universe, he has a thing or two in common with Putin and Saudi Prince Salma and they're all working hard to take over the world. In reality, everyone knows the Senate President secret ambition is to be president in the future.
In watching football, you can't escape from politics whilst in writing almost every subject you touch can become political.
This year our FIFA ranking before the World Cup is the 48th position. Super Eagles scored 2-0 against Iceland. Ahmed Musa made history by becoming the highest scoring Nigerian in the history of the world cup.
