By Alex C
Following Nigeria’s ouster in the just concluded World Cup that held in Brazil, Nigerian football has been plunged into crisis with the confirmation of the much dreaded FIFA suspension of Nigerian Football Federation (NFF).
There is a possibility of Nigeria’s suspension from FIFA related events including African competitions could evolve into an outright ban by Wednesday July 16 2014 if issues relating to Nigeria’s suspension are not addressed by mid-night of Tuesday July 15 2014.
A ban will mean not watching the darling Super Eagles and a host of Nigerian clubs play continental football. For investors- corporate sponsors, broadcast right acquisition companies, merchandize manufacturers and many more- the prospective FIFA ban will mean loss running into millions of dollars.
FIFA have clearly stated that for the decision of a suspension to be overturned, ‘the properly elected NFF Executive Committee, the NFF general assembly and the NFF administration [must be]able to work without any interference in their affairs’. It also says that ‘court actions [against them must]have been withdrawn’.
In the event that these conditions are not met, various sponsors of the Nigerian national team- Guinness, Globacom, Malta Guinness, Peak Milk, Tom Tom- will see their potent marketing asset, the Super Eagles, rendered valueless for the duration of the ban.
The fallout of a possible ban will also hit the media hard. Broadcast and transmission of football in Nigeria is a lucrative niche business with the rights for transmission of the World Cup on terrestrial television in Nigeria said to have cost in excess of $5 million.
With the new direction of the Confederation of African Football (CAF) which seeks to similarly optimize what is known in sports business circles as ‘TV money’, the rights to broadcast the AFCON tournament as well as the qualifiers which begins in weeks will attract a steep premium.
While the Super Eagles will possibly not taking part in any qualification, broadcast companies will see a fantastic investment opportunity slip away. As a plethora of brands fall over each other to secure advertisement placements during Super Eagles’ games, the total loss of revenue will easily run into hundreds of millions of naira.
The potential ban will prevent Nigerian clubs from participating in lucrative continental competitions such as the CAF Champions League and the CAF Confederations Cup, both of which are title sponsored by telecommunications heavyweights Orange. This will see Nigerian clubs miss out on an excellent opportunity to generate revenue as group stage participants in the Orange CAF Champions League could earn between $400,000 and $1.5 million.
The Orange CAF Confederations Cup also promises lucrative prize money with participants of the group stage possibly earning between $150,000 and $625,000 as well as a total of $125,000 paid out to national football associations of participating clubs.