I think he probably will too.
Victor Osimhen | out of options | goes to Gala on loan
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Ok that makes it sound (logically) like he’s not interested and so Toney is their next choice
None ever proven to my knowledge, but Kanu, Okocha, Martins, West, Yakubu and several others were accused of being older than their actual age.
Think Moyes said of Yakubu "he's 25, albeit a Nigerian 25". Redknapp once joked he was really 49.
At this stage it's just become a bad joke.
Seems so.
So casual racism and accusations without proof interesting
In any case Osimhen has been on the world scene since u17 world cup and even before, there is not doubt about his age
There's some cases (Moukoko being one that seems more solid than a random assertion) but it's not as strongly evidenced as you'd think by how often it gets thrown in there.
Yeah, accusations, but accusations only, and all based on the same stereotype. Of course, age cheating has happened but I'd say it would be very unlikely to have happened on any significant scale in the last 20 years as advances in medical testing and record keeping have occurred, and in Osimhen's case, it would be pretty much impossible since he's been in the National youth set-up and played at every age group, which means he's been MRI tested over and over again.
When teams and players are still being scanned and getting punished because of overage players at youth tournamenas, it's not going to go away anytime soon. It's been an ongoing thing for as long as I can remember. Roger Milla was supposed to be almost 50 in 1990 or 1994.
Like I said, at this stage, it's a bad joke that keeps getting brought up about individual players.
Cameroon banished 32 u17 players just last year because of the MRI tests.
So the age cheats are being dealt with domestically and therefore not making it to Europe? Also how would that have anything to do with Nigeria?
Just answering your point about age cheating being done on a significant scale. It's got nowt to do with Oshimen or Nigeria.
But these things still happen and people will still make the same bad jokes about the ages of individual African players, regardless of what country they are from.
Casual racism? That's a massive stretch. Guess this article from the BBC is racist then?
https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/26174252
Seems there's a few documented cases, particularly the 1989 Nigerian Youth team: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Age_fraud_in_association_football#Africa
BBC report here on 'rampant' age fraud in Africa: https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/26174252
And then there's this kid, who was 17... when this photo was taken. Cameroonian though: https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/26162408
So the rich history (Nigerian) you were referring to is a single incident that dates over 30 years?
Nope, there's more, just read the page and then google the unconfirmed cases also. These are just the one's that got caught.
He was though, it was investigated and cleared.
There's arguably some elements of a stereotype at play when it gets thrown just on the basis of nationality. Also in the larger context of talking about immigrants defrauding the legal protections for minors (in claiming refugee status or if arrested by police) where MRI / bone density testing will come up.
Athletes lying about their age do happen and obviously it's more common from some African or South American regions where presumably birth certificate record keeping and testing for age may not be as readily available. You'd think however that once they enter the European pro system -given past cases, current state of medicine and the very large sums involved in pro football- it's a lot harder to get away with it.
I completely agree, and I'm sure Osimhen is the age they say he is, my comment was more tongue in cheek than anything, but for arguments sake, would you trust Napoli in this instance? Italian teams love a cover up.
There is no question over whether or not age cheating happens at the grassroots level in Africa. It clearly does.
But what you said was there is a rich history of Nigerian players falsifying their ages for work permits [in Europe], in order to infer that this might be true for Victor Osimhen. This is not true as there is no such history.
First, unless you mean to suggest that Nigeria = Africa, I don't see why you're providing evidence of Camerounian age cheats and the like. What does that prove here, unless you mean to argue that all African countries are the same, so whatever is true for one is true for all?
Secondly, these are players who were all caught domestically either at local age-grade competitions or by their home federation, further proving that the likelihood of age cheats making it to Europe is close to zero since there is a pretty strong barrier to them even making it as professionals in the first place. I would imagine that top European clubs would likely conduct further due diligence with similarly advanced medical techniques.
In fact, it's an argument that sits on its own head. If there is such an issue with age cheating that it leads to such an extensive testing regime, wouldn't that instead suggest that a player who passes all those tests and makes it to Europe is about as certain as can be to be the age he claims?
Your comment about Osimhen was, therefore, completely out of place in almost every way. There is literally no history of a European club having proven issues with a Nigerian age cheat.
Well when I made that comment it was tongue in cheek and I was mostly referring to the Nigerian players that have played in the PL over the last 20 years or so. I can remember off the top off my head Kanu, Martins and Yakubu all having their age questioned? Not officially though from what I remember.
I'm not disagreeing with anything you've said here, it's probably very difficult to get away with this these days, however you're assuming that a team that signs a player will then openly and unprovoked tell the world that the player they just spent a bunch of money on is in fact much older than they originally thought they were.
Moukoko is also not Nigerian
Yes the comment from Moyes was casually racist, I don't see the BBC article saying or joking someone is lying about their age without proof
Just because its a problem in African football or has been does not mean you can casually say that about any African player
Ah sorry, I thought you were referring to the suggestion that there was age fraud, but yeah, Moyes wasn't really good with his words.
You can remember a lot of casual racism towards Nigerian players in the PL
Perhaps that's exactly why I remember it.
I was addressing the assertion in general because specifically designating Nigeria is a little absurd to begin with.
I could see a club finding a player is perhaps lying about his age ex post facto and looking the other way or not digging itself into an hole about it. I'd like to think it is less likely the more clubs are involved.
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Bro come on, you're making this bigger than it is.
Inaccurate date of births are common place for people from South Asian and African countries, I've recruited double digit amount of doctors for the NHS who's birthday is 1/1/19something. Many of my best friends parents genuinely do not know their own date of birth.
I think it's pretty common knowledge from people within the game that ages of African players are not always accurate, nobody really cares unless its a youth tournament (and there is evidence that age cheating is happening at African youth tournaments). By the time these players make it to Europe, nobody cares how old they are, as most of the time they're good enough to be playing senior football.
It would be a wasted resource to confirm ages of players.
Not if it impacts their resale value down the road.
I think there's a difference between inaccurate birth records (where you think the average variance would be in general a couple of years off) -or something like South Korea counting age/DoB differently- and players shaving multiple years off which often seems to be the implication.
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Can anyone explain to me why Arsenal aren't in for Oshimen if the price is around 65mil?
Probably because the price was 100m about a week ago
We are not talking about accidentally inaccurate dates of birth. We are talking about deliberate age fraud and I'm really not sure what your overall point is.
1. How exactly have I made it (what exactly?) bigger than it is?
2. Are you suggesting that football clubs don't care what age you are and that the value of players has nothing to do with their ages as long as they are good enough in the present? That would suggest a staggering lack of understanding of the game.
This is just you wanting to be different
Osimhen is nowhere near, and he isn't even better than Lukaku at the same age. I don't even understand the hype. Where does it come from? His only elite traits are his physicality and aerial ability, and he arguably only have had one great season and that was in Napoli's title winning season where he scored 26 goals. All the other seasons he has failed to score more than 15 goals.
Lukaku scored 23 and 24 in his first two seasons for Inter, it didn't make him a world class striker.
What this shows is that there is an extreme lack of great strikers these days, probably because the game has changed, but also other factors. However, rating Osimhen over Haaland is genuinely unfathomable.
Outscored by the likes of Tammy Abraham, Scamacca and a 36 year old Giroud in 2 of his 3 seasons....
Tweeter wisdom is that the player has too heavy personal demands.
Goals per 90 mins
| 23/24 | 22/23 | 21/23 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Osimhen | 0.68 | 0.91 | 0.63 |
| Giroud | 0.57 | 0.54 | 0.52 |
| Scamacca | 0.74 | 0.29 | 0.67 |
| Abraham | 0.38 | 0.33 | 0.49 |
So only Scamacca who actually had good seasons and Osimhen out of all the players you mentioned showed the highest ceiling and the most consistency
He wants £429m a week or something around that
You're really obsessed with him mate. I'll let you be. I can only take it you have never watched him so can't see his glaring deficiencies. He had 2 average seasons and one good sesson. Players like Ciro Immobile looked comfortably better than him, yet he couldn't even hack it at Dortmund.
Indeed given hes the main striker for my national team I have never watched him, but who is to stop you spouting incorrect facts on the internet ey?
Good luck to you having clearly not watch players enough but spouting nonsense on the internetHaha this makes far more sense now. Good luck
If I've learned one thing on the Caf, it's that there's zero point when it comes to trying to chat to posters with nationality bias. Best of luck to you bud.
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