Nasty,... nasty injury towards the end. Looked like his leg was turned in a bad way... never seen something like that on a contested ball with a keeper, maybe on a bad tackle but not with a keeper. Completely took the energy out of the crowd too who had been having fun up until then...
http://www.betexplorer.com/soccer/nigeria/premier-league/ So the league's been back for over a month now,... https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9T47F8_ea2AwxqjbX3XwHw/videos?sort=dd&view=0&shelf_id=0 ...what happened... are they done now? Here I was getting so excited to find them apparently listening to someone with some business acumen about how they could finally grow their product. They had improved pitch conditions (though not perfect still) to a very presentable level. They had encouraged teams to either choose better or repair current stadiums for use in the top league. El Kanemi Warriors ground was a bit of a shame compared to others, but the fact that they were even playing football in Maiduguri was a miracle in and of itself. They had apparently improved security conditions to a level that fans were no longer afraid to come to matches all across the league. They had advertised their product and got attendance increases at some of the top sides as well as some of the newer sides. MFM was encouraging. They had improved lighting to allow for more night matches. They got quality commentators who made you feel excited for our league and expressed our footballing culture in our own way. The officiating was better. In fact, considering the reputation of the officiating in matches in the past favoring home sides for fear of reprisals, I expected even an improved product to be highly suspect. That's not what I saw, granted they were limited clips, but they showed all of the key points of the matches like goals, cards, etc. Very little controversy and away sides were always competitive. But the thing that made me happiest was that they had finally got a channel on Youtube for highlights to show their improving product to potential fans of the league. You had a goal nominated for a Puskas award and showcased on CNN. You were building a potential revenue source for the league; MLS's YT channel started out averaging 500-1000 views per video and now each highlight averages around 25,000 views and tops out in the hundreds of thousands. YT pays ad revenue for those levels of views, and Nigerians can certainly put out view counts at those levels if our music videos are any indication. So does the league follow up with the channel this season? So far, no... Maybe it was delayed as well last year,... no idea. So what's going on? Is it the expense of production? I don't see why,... assuming that they care enough to do it. Me and a friend could cut together a quality video production with two drones outfitted with HD cameras. It might not be live and have to be cut together and shown on delay, but it would be out there for consumption at a professional picture quality. The commentary team might be expensive, but you have to invest something in your product. Hopefully I'm being premature and the vids start coming back before long... but I'm worried. Whatever genius decided to start organizing the Youtube channel probably got fired by someone who wanted to take the money he was spending on production and spend it on his swimming pool or a second house. I hope this is not the case. Any of our media members on this site, could you guys put out some inquiries as to the state of this channel? Calling... @zahzah !? I don't know who else here has a column... E2A: Only three vids have been uploaded this calender year with an "all set for 2017 video two months ago, and two videos this week; one of which was a video of Olatunbasun's goal. Video of the entire match highlights would have been nice...