Super Eagles captain, Ahmed Musa, has stated that fans are more interested in staking bets on Nigeria during matches rather than hoping for the progress of the team.
He said most fans do not support Eagles because they like them, instead it is because they placed bets with the hopes of becoming rich if the team wins.
He spoke on Friday while delivering a speech in Lagos during a ceremony to unveil the team’s ‘Let’s Do It Again’ mantra in their bid to win a fourth AFCON title at next year’s edition in Ivory Coast.
Ahmed said he cried bitterly when Super Eagles failed to qualify for the 2022 World Cup in Qatar but the fans never understood the sacrifices they made.
According to him, disappointed supporters often rain insults on them after any game that Nigeria did not win, saying things like ‘you cut my ticket, you no sabi play’ ‘hey dem don cut my ticket, give me my money’
In his words; “I cried a lot when we didn’t qualify for the 2022 World Cup. I know what our former NFF president (Pinnick) did at that time. Players stayed in hotel rooms which cost about N500,000.
He did his best so that we qualified for the World Cup. We lost a lot of money and that is why most of our players right now are facing challenges because we failed to qualify for the World Cup. So, we as players lost so much money.
No matter where you are playing you always go down into your corner to think when you lose money. Nowadays I understand what football is and the anger of the fans. Most of us don’t support Super Eagles because we like them, they will say, ‘hey dem don cut my ticket, give me my money’ (hey they’ve spoilt my ticket, refund my money). You’ll see on most of our DMs ‘you cut my ticket, you no sabi play’ (you spoilt my ticket, you don’t know how to play), its because they are bettors. Before, you’ll see the love and passion for the team but nowadays, betting has spoilt everything.
So, please I am begging the media to please take it easy with these young boys, they can’t take too much pressure. That is why whenever they go onto the pitch to play they panic because they are thinking about what they are going to see on their accounts on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.
What do you think forced Odion Ighalo out of Eagles? They threatened to kill his family and he had to quit. Why will you threaten to kill my family just because I play for my country. When you go outside you see how they worship us, but when you come back home they treat you like nobody.”
