One has to be honest to say that the domestic Nigerian women's football scene is looking delightfully vista and scenic these days.
The apex NWFL league, which has a glossy, attractive-looking website and well manned, monitored and maintained social media presence, runs like clockwork with passion, drive and determination from players to coaches to administrators and all concerned. The lower leagues to the grassroots - which only recently produced supremely talented, future Oshoala in Chidi Harmony - are teeming with young tantalizing talents who are players peckish for promotion and progression to the pagoda and pinnacle of footballing greatness.
Hence, more is expected of Nigeria's representatives to this year’s CAF Women's Champions League. Edo Queens has a quotient of quality players who are more than capable of announcing themselves big-time in the tournament as veritable A-Listers among fellow big girls drawn from the most well-run leagues on the continent.
But, for the all strides our local ladies have made in the local league in more recent seasons with moderate support and financial injections from some powerful benefactors and good-Samaritans with a few cash to spare, I still habour concerns.
When it comes to the technical side, I remain worried that our game is sadly 2 Kobo short of the 1 Naira needed to purchase success or tactical credibility beyond the shores of the country.
You watch some of the local league matches and you easily spot embarrassing tactical gaps here and there with disjointed movements lacking in imagination and ingenuity and some comical moments in execution of basic routines and manoeuvres that really belong to the more rudiment era of women's football of years, decades gone by.
But the silver lining is these girls/ladies/women, whatever the politically correct term to use, are fabulously talented with scope to expand their existing skillset to rub shoulders with some of the best women footballers on the planet.
Unfortunately, these raw female talents are let down by moribund and out-dated coaching techniques which spawns poor instructions, rudimentary football equipment, structures and infrastructure, safety concerns (particularly in the northern part of the country), poor remunerations, tendencies for unpaid emoluments, cultural and religious impediments, sexual exploitation, favoritism and several other vices.
Which has meant that many of our supremely fit, nimble and agile female players remain just that - raw diamonds - until they manage to find their way to foreign leagues to be refined and reproduced as heavy-hitters like Deborah Abiodun.
But some would argue that, that refinement is already obtainable in the local women's league leading to Edo Queens' swashbuckling, all-conquering performance and outcome in the earlier WAFU competition which qualified them for this tournament as proof.
If so, I will be keen to see, not just how far they go in this tournament, but how they go about their business regardless of progress made. The brand of football they play and the tactical and technical injections brought to bear will to me be a vital barometers to be monitored.
They wanted to be here, they are now here, let's see how they get on.
Good luck Edo Queens!
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