British High Commission Stops Super Seven From Anfield Tourney

Super Seven Football Club will not represent Nigeria at
the Road To Anfield Five Aside Championship scheduled
for 7 May in Liverpool, England following the refusal of
British High Commission in Nigeria to grant the team
visas to attend in the competition sponsored by Standard
Chartered Bank .
The ‘ Standard Chartered Trophy’ is an international five -
a - side football tournament organized by the bank in
partnership with Liverpool FC that offers football fans a
once in a life time ‘ Money Can’ t Buy ’ opportunity of
playing at an English Premier League football pitch .
Super Seven emerged the overall winners in Nigeria
recently and represented the country at the regional
circuit in Accra, Ghana where they emerged the regional
winners which guaranteed them a ticket to play at the
England .
P . M. NEWS gathered that the team submitted their
necessary documents on 27 March to the British High
Commission to facilitate their trip to Liverpool, but were
refused visas on 14 April by the officials who alleged that
the players may not return to the country .
Sponsor of the team , Tayo Ogundele stated that he was
shocked that while British High Commissions of other
countries where winners emerged for the tourney were
given visas long before now Nigerian was denied . “ It is
rather unfortunate that British High Commission in Nigeria
does not have respect for Nigerian citizens at all .
What happened to my team , can happen to an individual,
organization or football team like ours . After my team
secured a ticket to Road to Anfield sponsored by one of
British popular bank , Standard Chartered Bank , we
quickly applied for visas and by the time we returned to
the High Commission , we were denied visas .
One of the officials said my players are very young and
there is no assurance that they will come back to the
country after the competition even despite the assurance
giving the High Commission by the bank in Nigeria . ”
In his own remark , Captain of the team , Samuel Idowu
expressed his frustration over the attitude of the High
Commission .
He lamented that the team went through difficult time
qualifying for the Anfield tourney . He urged the title
sponsor , Standard Chartered Bank to wade into the
matter .
“ We players were in tears when we were denied visas .
Everbody knows that we are Nigeria champions and West
Africa Champions which automatically qualified us to
participate at the Road To Anfield competition in
Liverpool.
“ We are using this medium to call on Nigeria Football
Federation , NFF and relevant authorities to look into this
matter because what the British High Commission did to
us shows that they don’ t have respect for Nigerian
citizens despite the fact that we presented all the
necessary documents for the trip , ” he said.