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KUNLE SONAME, Remo Stars FC Owner Explains
“In Remo Stars, the academy players you see there are kids that are unable to make the cut in Europe.
“They’re the ones that go in there. And it should be the other way around. Our best legs in the academy should feed into the team, should feed into the senior team.”
“That is what obtains everywhere else in the world.”
“Every league sells mostly on television. Television provides a lot of the funding for most leagues. Even the European League, EPL, and so on and so forth, they require television.”
“And Television covers good products. The matches have to be good for television to invest in it. And for the matches to be good, you need first-class venues.”
“First-class venues and first-class coverages. What hope for us in Nigerian football where there’s no television, proper television? There are no proper grounds.”
“So for the league to even make money from its primary source of making money, where others make money, we don’t even have that opportunity. Add this to everything else that you were saying before. Over to you.:
“So it’s clear to everyone that money in football is from TV. That’s where the bulk of the money comes from.”
“I don’t know how to say this without sounding a bit offensive. We just need to organise this league better. We are moving forward, but the pace… I don’t even know if that is correct to say that we are moving forward.”
Last Season, two seasons ago, we had TV. And now we don’t even have TV anymore. So I’m not even sure we are moving forward.
“But having said that, something was clear to me. I thought just putting the games on TV would sell itself. But we have been proven wrong in the past two, three seasons.
The matches were on TV. But the money still didn’t come. So quite clearly, a bit more needs to be done.
It’s not just putting it on TV. It has to be marketed properly.
“And the product has to be attractive. The football has to be attractive.”
“To market it, it must be attractive. Nobody would want to go to a stadium or watch a game where the goalkeeper holds the ball, then he starts to sleep on the ground. I mean, he sleeps like 10, 15 minutes out of the 90 minutes.”
“Of course, who wants to see that? But good enough, people have sought for that. You cannot hold the ball for more than eight seconds, then it’s a foul against you. Too many things.”
We just need to sit down, sit down properly and rearrange this thing. That is what needs to happen. We need to sit down, put the right people to sit down, people that are knowledgeable to sit down and craft out the way forward for this.”
“Because if not, we’ll just be running around. Of course, we are going to survive. I mean, because like I said, we fund Remo Stars from the money from Beyond Limits.
So any wise person would just go to the academy. I mean, the league itself, that’s a professional team itself. It’s just a drainpipe.”
“But it’s good. I mean, it’s good for the branding. I mean, I’m sure many people know Rainbow Stars and they don’t know Beyond Limits.”
“So it’s good for the branding. But the money comes from Beyond Limits. The money comes from the academy.
“That’s where, look, in the academy between at least this season, we’ve sold six players. And these are young boys and they command far bigger money. Because like I said, we are selling expectation.
“So I mean, if they will buy a player in Rainbow Stars for let’s say 100,000, 200,000, they buy players from the academy for 500,000, 600,000 euros. So that’s where the money is, for sure. I mean, look at Ibiidi.”
That is another guy that is doing very good football business. He doesn’t even participate in the league. He’s not interested.
“He just remains in NLU, this amateur league, just to have registration. That’s all. And of course, I mean, he’s just commissioned his school of football.”
“He has two pitches, brand new pitches, because that’s where the money is. But of course, for proper development, I agree that we must translate this into the NPFL, because that is the gold standard of football in any country. But we need to sit down, organise properly, do all we can, take all decisions for the benefit of the game.”
“That is important. Not for any other benefit, but for the benefit of the game. Can state governments hands-off running of clubs now? Is it possible? Yes, it is possible.
And the way to do this is to… There will still be parts of it, because you provide… I mean, they’ve provided infrastructures anyway. They own the stadiums. So, they can actually get investors just to come and run, but they own the facilities.
So, they can hold on to 30%, 40%, whatever it is, but get people that will put their own money. When people put their money in enterprises, they tend to look at it a lot better than OPM, other people’s money. Whether it’s on TV, it’s not on TV.”
“Honestly, I don’t care. But if it is their money, they will fight tooth and nail to take the right decisions for the league. I am not a wise businessman.”
“So, just listening to you, I will not put my money in running a club. I would rather put my money in running the academy. But that’s not the issue now.”
“What of the facilities we use now, the football grounds we play on, what are your thoughts on it? If we can… We don’t have… We have only one football ground in the whole country that can host Grade A international FIFA matches. And in my own humble knowledge, even that pitch is not good enough. For me, that pitch is not as good as Liberty Stadium was in the 60s and 70s.
It’s not as good. Because the Liberty Stadium ground was as good as Barcelona is today, then. So, what are we not doing right? The only good pitch we have is probably your own and, I don’t know, one other somewhere.”
“And those ones are still not FIFA level. Why do you say FIFA? We diminish it. Because FIFA themselves don’t know what they are doing up to a certain extent.
“But we are talking of grade. Pitches where the best matches can be played. No matter how poor the teams are, when they hit those pitches, they play well. And those matches can now be sold for television.”
“Anyway, what do you think about the facilities in Nigeria? Okay. There’s definitely a debt of facilities. That is clear to everyone.
“And for me, that is where government needs to spend money. Not in running clubs. Very good.
“Just provide the infrastructures, sporting infrastructures. That is the beauty of government. Very good.
I’ve been privileged to be part of what they are doing in Portugal, football-wise. So, if you go to Portugal, this is a country of about 9.8 million people. They have pitches for kids to train, international matches.
“They have over 1,000. For 9.8 million people, they have over 1,000. Here, you have just said it, maybe we only have you to play Grade A matches.
“That is where government needs to spend money. Provide infrastructures. Let the business people come and do the business of football.”
Very good. It can be done sustainably. I keep saying it.
“When people put their money, when it is your own money that is different from other people’s money, OPM, we tend to take better decisions. If you have a private league in Nigeria, for instance, I can tell you for free that it will do better than what we have now. Not because they are better, not because they are more clever than the other people, but because it is their money.”
“They will look at it properly. They will take decisions in the best interest of the game. One statement, then one question.
“The statement is I visited, I think it is Manchester University or University of Manchester, one of the two. We went for a competition, Nigeria School Sports Federation competition.
“I think it is Manchester University or University of Manchester. They had 35 football fields. 35 football fields in a university.
The list of those pitches is as good as the one within a university campus. This was a competition by the Nigeria School Sports Federation. Continental competitions.”
I am feeling sorry, not for you, but for all those that qualify in our league and have to play at this continental competition.
How expensive is it to play in these championships?
Well, to prosecute an away game, maybe you spend like 100, 120 million in your own home.
I am just laughing because you can imagine winning your championship now, your league, and then you have to prosecute one match away with 100 and something million.
Yeah, I mean, it is what it is. That is the cost.
You can’t shy away from it. You have to pay for tickets. You have to pay for hotels.
It is what it is. You spend minimum 100, 120. I mean, we have been doing this regularly.
And the 500 I spoke about for the season is for the local league. So, if you qualify, this is in addition to it..
If you are playing, let me even burst your bubble. When it was clear that we were to meet Mamelodi.
Mamelodi approached us that they are open to host us in South Africa for both legs because they knew that we were renovating our turf. So, they knew that we are not going to play in our stadium.
These are expenses. So, what did they offer? They said, we will pay you for your flight tickets.
You don’t need to hire any pitch. You play on our pitch. The gate takings and the TV for the first leg, which is your own home game, you will receive.
Wow. And they will host you till in second leg, which is their own.
In my mind, a businessman without pride or arrogance should have taken the offer. We didn’t take the offer because of the prestige of Nigeria. That, no, we are not going to agree to that.
No, no, no, no, no. But we knew that, look, that was the right thing to do.
I mean, commercially, yeah, because it was clear to me that we obviously need the extra income.”
-Interview By Segun Odegbami
