Look at youthful USA U-20 young GIRLS we are celebrating our cheats beating.

http://www.fifa.com/tournaments/photo/photolist.html#1277659

Cheating is embedded and celebrated in our culture.

Watch the highlights here from 12s to 20s when they showed the Naija players and then the US/England girls and see the difference:

http://www.fifa.com/u20womensworldcup/highlights/video/video=1277684/index.html

http://www.fifa.com/u20womensworldcup/highlights/video/video=1273908/index.html


And when we don't get our "birthright of respect" from SAcans, UK etc, we moan and wonder why. What the fck is so respectable about us when we are so shameless?

If the Nigerian team lost the match nobody will be talking about their age now. But, since they won somebody  has to prove how stu.pid they are by saying unsubstantiated facts and showing their inferiority complex. If Nigeria has been using over-aged players always then we won't be getting to the semifinal for the first time just now, may be we should have won all past editions.

Sagamite

No one here has any empirical evidence showing that these girls are truly overage or underage. That being said, it is unfair to conclude, based on anecdotal evidence, that the girls are overage. It is also undisputed that poor economic conditions amid poverty usually ages our girls faster than their foreign counterparts, and, as such, they have a tendency to appear older than they really are. Bottom line, I would avoid speaking in the affirmative without credible evidence, for if USA had defeated the girls (like they normally do), we most likely will not be having these conversation.

Na wa for how some Nigerians reason. If any body should question the age of our girls, i think it should be FIFA, or US FA, not some Jobless fools here on NL. If FIFA was convinced beyond all reasonable doubt that the gals are still within under 20 of age, how can some one jst assume they are above 20 only by their looks. There is higher tendency that people might look younger or older than their age. It suprises me how someone can claim intelligence in concluding peoples age based on a mere picture looks.

I don't them sha, becoz they sit behind their computer in an environment where everthing is at their disposal. They wake every morning looking themselves at the mirror, young and fresh, as such every one within their age age range must look young and fresh like them. They should go back to Nigeria and train one month under the sun, with the stress of life in Nigeria, lets see the difference. I see men and women of 60-70years here still playing volley ball, badminton, exercising every morning, looking fresh and young, you go to Nigeria men and women of 50-60years are walking with stick, looking as if they are at their nineties, due to the Stress of life in Africa. Yet someone can assume that a teenage African girl should look as young as a teenager from a developed world. I no blame una sha {sigh}

Princek12:

Sagamite

No one here has any empirical evidence showing that these girls are truly overage or underage. That being said, it is unfair to conclude, based on anecdotal evidence, that the girls are overage. It is also undisputed that poor economic conditions amid poverty usually ages our girls faster than their foreign counterparts, and, as such, they have a tendency to appear older than they really are. Bottom line, I would avoid speaking in the affirmative without credible evidence, for if USA had defeated the girls (like they normally do), we most likely will not be having these conversation.

Bruv, abeg, come on lets stop making excuses that are not valid. We will only be decieving ourselves.

Poverty usually ages our girls faster than their foreign counterparts? Come on!

Poverty makes us look like old people? This does not shine!

Poverty makes about 19 players out of 23 look like old people every time we need to raise a football team? Not 1, not 2, not 5, but 19?

Lets not decieve ourselves all in the name of trying to sweep a shameful disgrace under the carpet.

Here is a video of a 23 year old Naija girl that lives in poverty. How come poverty has not aged her and she looks young and under 20? This is a random selection, she is not some beauty queen or the daugther of one!

See min 3.43

[flash=400,350]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ub46BwrKOhU&feature=related[/flash]

Only when we need to assembly footballers is when all """girls""", """kids""", """boys""" selected look like 32 year olds and this aging only applies to Nigeria and other African countries that have no shame! And we start make excuses to cover up.

My friend, poverty stunts/delays growth in youth, not age you!

Am usually astonished when a single argument always changes to name calling. RELAX MY PEOPLE

These are people in their late 20s, one or two in early 20s and one or two in early 30s. Simple as [size=18pt]A, B, C[/size].



Poverty or no poverty!

UNRESTRAINED, UNPRINCIPLED, UNABASHED CHEATING!

Same 3 adjectives you will add to Naija politicians in their looting.

Negro please!!

Give it a rest already.

I notice many Nigerians no longer believe we can do anything good. That explains why many of us now believe that anything we achieve is so because we cheated or bribed or did something corrupt. It is not always like that. There are times when we should give ourselves a befinit of the doubt.

It is a fact that a Caucasian of same age as an African will look bigger, fresher and younger while the African will look smaller, tougher and older. The difference is enviromental and the socio-economic status is the primary indicator.

Therefore we cannot determine correctly, by visual inspection alone, even the approximate ages of a young Caucasian and a young African with different environmental backgrounds. It will be purely conjectural if we do that, and one should not stick out his/her neck based only on a guess work.

So let us go back to praising the falconets. They did a great job! That last nigerian penalty was incredible.

I promised myself not to reply to a certain creature on this thread and I'm sticking to it. FBS got a rep to maintain.

@ALL
Quit the name calling else you will face the full force of the law. You all know what I mean.
Let's keep the discuss civil.
Thanks.

Sagamite,U rly have to chill on this, ok, they MIGHT be over 20 but then sod it,would you prefer it if they were HONESTLY selling pure water. We should be hailing them not degrading them.

Come on, lets deceive ourselves.

Take a look at a genuine 16 year old. It is just a "tough environment and poverty" that makes him look older. His old looks also helped him perform in the NPL at age 13. You are guaranteed, 5 years from now, he would not be able to run as fast anymore, contrary to biological facts and logic that as he gets older than 16, he should be at his athletic peak.

LETS DECEIVE OURSELVES!

Oya!

Those boys passed the MRI test, so what are you talking bout this time??

Okija_juju:

Those boys passed the MRI test, so what are you talking bout this time??

MRI scan conducted by NFF?

MRI scan that Chukwudi and Okoro passed?

Give me a break.

Having waded into this conversation yesterday and having watched it degenerate into absurdity, I should give it one more stab to rest my case. If I may boldly state, this is a response to Sagamite, and brother, I hope you see the point of this response.

1. On the issue of the picture which you posted to advance an allegation of age fraud against the Falconet and the Nigerian NFF, here's why the picture is a spurious evidence.

Insofar as size is concerned, it simply requires another person to produce a concomitant picture of another team  in which the players appear bigger than your picture and your case falls. And indeed, FBS did just that.

Now  realize that neither you nor the person who produces the counter picture has a case as you cannot necessarily prove the age of player (especially with a threshold of age limit as it is in this case) through a picture. But again, so long, as another person can find a picture with people that appear bigger than yours, your case may not stand. Note that here and in the previous paragraph I have stressed the word 'appear.' I am sure you understand the point of this.

Yet again on picture, to even argue from this premise, one would have to have pictures of the same size and optimization for all the teams. I'm sure a tenacious person would find  a different picture of the Falconets that makes them appear younger than the one that Sagamite has posted.

2. On argument according to size which is central to your allegation, you cannot prove your case with a picture nor by just referencing size.

Would we then infer from such an argument that the South Korean who look smaller (at least to me) than other teams are the youngest team as far as it regards age? Or are we to suppose that since they look small, there are no twenty year olds among them? If there are, and since by your argument they'd be the youngest team, does it not mean through logic (your word) that all other teams that have bigger players have fielded over age players? This is, of course, argument to absurdity as I'm sure you'd know, but it is necessary to show that your argument does not hold.

If we argue along this line, to be able to fit all other teams within the age limit of twenty, we would have to fix the average age of the South Korean around ten or eleven (or lower)  and then build from there. We may likely have this order:

South Korea
North Korea (this is already absurd since we may assume that South Koreans live better than North Koreans, shouldn't we?)
Japan
Colombia, and so on and perhaps end this way:

USA
Nigeria (if, in fact, we agree with you that the Falconets are bigger than the Americans)
Switzerland
New Zealand
Germany
Sweden

This, of course is absurd. But even arguing along this line, Nigeria would still not be the biggest team.

3. Still on size. What do we mean? Do we mean height as the above seem to imply? If so, then if Nigeria is overage then the USA and the teams below Nigeria in the foregoing list have also fielded overage players since those teams are taller on the average than the Nigerian team.

Again on size, if we may cite an example from Africa. Cameroonians tend to look bigger than Nigerians while Ghanaians tend to look smaller. Are we to therefore imply that Cameroon cheat all the time in age grade competitions or that Ghanaians are on the average younger than Nigerians?

4. From the foregoing, it appears then that if by big or size we mean height we cannot argue from that premise. Here is why (from the Atlantic Review).

The Dutch - now the planet's tallest nation - tower over their US counterparts by around 4.7cm (1.8in) for men and 5.7cm (2.2in) for women, research published in the Annals of Human Biology journal shows.  In the First World War, the average American soldier was still two inches taller than the average German. But sometime around 1955 the situation began to reverse. The Germans and other Europeans went on to grow an extra two centimetres a decade, and some Asian populations  several times more, yet Americans haven’t grown taller in fifty years. By now, even the Japanese—once the shortest industrialized people on earth—have nearly caught up with us, and Northern Europeans are three inches taller and rising.
The average American man is only five feet nine and a half—less than an inch taller than the average soldier during the Revolutionary War.  Women, meanwhile, seem to be getting smaller. (, )

Compared with people in thirty-six other industrialized countries, it showed, Americans rank twenty-eighth in average longevity—just above the Irish and the Cypriots (the Japanese top the rankings),  “What is the difference between Western Europe and the U.S. that would work in this direction? It’s not income, since Americans, at least on paper, have been wealthier for more than a century.
-------------
Now, although people may posit reasons for why Europeans are now taller than Americans and why even Japanese have been growing taller and Americans not, for the purpose of our argument, it means that if we postulate height as our argument then it logically (your word) follows that we are inevitably led into the fallacy of concluding that Europeans of the same age bracket as Americans are in fact older than Americans.

5. From all  we've said above, it may be deduced that size is simply not a matter of nutrition (although this may be a factor) as Sagamite has construed it, but there may be other factors. For, since Cameroonians are on the average bigger than Nigerians, are we to argue that they live better than Nigerians and that Nigerians live better than Ghanaian since Nigerians are on the average bigger than Ghanaians. Or are we to conclude that Nigerians live better than Koreans, Japanese, and Chinese, since Nigerians are undoubtedly bigger than people from these countries?

But then, insofar as nutrition goes, history has recorded that people get bigger with improved conditions hence my original point. However, as the above shows, this is not a sufficient ground (nutrition that is) upon which one may build an argument for age fraud. Americans are wealthier than European and yet they are not growing taller.

Further, Fulanis from Northern Nigeria, who are mostly nomadic bush people (this is not meant to derogate) are on the average taller than most Nigerians. Should we from this conclude that they live better than most Nigerians?

6. When I mentioned my experience (something I generally eschew) it was to show that I have first hand experience dealing with people within this age group. I assume (and I believe not unreasonably) that many people that attend  university in Nigeria are pooled from the same swath of people as those who play for Nigeria. I met a lot of university students who did not come from wealthy families and they may as well have played for Nigeria if they had the requisite skill and opportunity. I do not believe it is a succesful argument to assume that Nigerian players come from poorer background than those who attend universities. Such an argument is suspiciously specious.

7. An underlining point to all this is not whether or not it's true that the Falconet are overage. Neither of us can prove the point for or against by mere assertions. Sagamite might be right, but again, he might not be. To make a case requires concrete evidence to back it up. To borrow an example from Sagamite, it is not enough to allege that Babangida is corrupt. In fact, we may all know it. What is required is enough evidence to convince a jury beyond reasonable doubt that IBB is corrupt. In other words, we may all know that IBB is corrupt, but until we can produce evidence to back up our supposition, our knowledge amounts to naught and it is far from undeniable or admissable "fact." And if we venture to go to a court of law on mere "fact", that is, our assertion and allegation, the best we can expect is our case thrown out and the worse expect to be jailed for defamation.

8. Finally, it became clear to me that sagamite might really be in jest since it appears he is an intelligent person as he himself asserts. Thus, I didn't need to write the preceding seven points, which as far as he may be concerned border on prolixity. But then I had my doubts because of the caustic nature of the debate. I assume that arguments based on "logic" should not stray from that premise. Of course, they may be in earnest, and if they are, the one making a point should be secure enough to eschew vitriols. For, don't we all know that we can make our point respectfully?

I have observed elsewhere that this seems to be the culture on Nairaland, which is unfortunate. However, I'm heartened by those who observe the "rule of law and decorum" to borrow a phrase from our late president. Some might tell me to shut up. That a public forum is a free for all where anything goes. Fair enough. But in normal life people who shout in the market place are seldom taken seriously. In fact, people either walk away or keep quiet. For if you also raise your voice to shout in return, it might be difficult to determine who among the two of you is in want of reason.

The atmosphere of hostility and abuse only spoils the place for those  who come to Nairaland to interact and fellowship with fellow country men and women. What does it say of a family that quarrels all the time?

I know, of course, that the next thing to follow my presumption is the word "silly" or perhaps "goat." Let me take cover then.

Adieu.

He is saying here: "I am only 16 years old and I have already scored 30 goals in the NPL. There is no proof I am cheating. I am honestly 16."

UP NIGERIA!!!

AH! Those boys made us PROUD.

Never knew Okoro now plays for the Falconettas? 

UP NAIJA!!!

Then the shameless crew will call for these "boys"  that made Nigeria proud to be given national honours like Grand Commander of the Grand Order of Orders!

They are NATIONAL heroes and role models to be immitated.

And then we wonder why Etteh (Madam Hairdresser speaker) is given national honour after being deposed for looting.

She no be national hero?

GREEEEEEEEEEEAT COUNTRY, GREEEEEEEEEEAT PEOPLE!

And they will get pissed when I say Nigeria is full of morons.

@JIY,

To cut the long story short, you are mistaken by thinking I am or was only referring to size.

The falcons size and FEATURES are not of people in their youth.

And if we had a moral and upstanding national press, a simple dig (the simplest) into their backgrounds will reveal the FRAUD!

And no, the Dutch are not the planets tallest people.

I think the initial move by Goodluck Jonathan to withdraw Nigeria from all football competitions was not a very well thought move. Hence, one could as well summe up that it was a foolish act. In other words, he acted foolishly! This means the boy that was criticizing him was quite right in his critique.

And do I have respect for his office? Oh yes I do! On another thought, I do not since he was not actually elected on a free and fair way. If he were an upright person, he would have declined to be VP on a ticket that was won through massive election rigging and wholesome thuggery. And btw, the guy is very shy, he definitely has to build more confidence.

This is not Jonathan bashing but criticizing him to make him not repeat the same mistake. If you do not show a man his foolish ways, he might not realize it. Jonathan, it was foolish of you that time. Please dont make such a blunder again. You dont cut your head off because you are having a headache.

for those who care to know what the fight after the match was about, here:

The Nigerian player had one of the corner flags, which she had clearly taken as a keepsake of the victory. This is not unusual these days after the last match at a tournament venue. I saw it a couple of times in the recent World Cup in South Africa. It is something like the American tradition of cutting down the nets after winning high school and collegiate basketball championships.

Anyway, one of the American staff was trying to grab it from her, which really demonstrated poor sportsmanship. I certainly hope he thought better of it and apologized later.

^^^ Thanks for the information.
Very vital.

@Sagamite i strongly agree with you but your proof means nufin! absolutely!

mama-gee:

Ewww, Who's that man in the pic?

He looks gross and ugly almost like a chimp.

Honestly, one can't put his life on the line that some are women.

Sagamite:

Honestly, one can't put his life on the line that some are women. 

mama-gee:

Lets play a game:

Can anyone here prove that any of the following people in this pix are not U-14?



Can anyone here prove that the woman in this pix is not U-20?



Can anyone here prove that any of the following people in this pix are not U-35?

I don't think anybody here has the ability to judge people's likely age range from pix.

Surely it is only poverty that made the women in the last pix look older than their early thirties ages. Otherwise they will look like Tyra Banks.  

Super kid star. He made us very proud playing those 16 year olds. He made us really, really, really proud. We are great and the best.

What a hero!

He even has the perfect messaic Jesus-like pose.

All he needs now is a crown of torns to be the messiah of our football.

He is the next Messi since he can bang in 25 goals in top flight from the ages of 13-16. Even past kid geniuses like Raul, Owen, Ronaldo and Messi can not dream of such stats.

For the doubting Thomases:

If you look hard enough and drop every ounce of objectivity in your brain and replace with so-called patriotism, then you can really convince yourself he looks 16.

Ewoo, uhmmm, see arguments lol.