The Chairman of Lagos State Football Association (LSFA), Hajji Gafar Olawale Liameed has predicted that clubs from his jurisdiction will soon populate the ranks of Nigerian Professional Football League (NPFL).
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With the current standings in Group B of the lower division Nigerian National League (NNL) indicating two LSFA outfits, Ikorodu City and Inter Lagos standing neck-to-neck as joint-first, Liameed feels vindicated to make his sweeping prediction.
He also took a look at the 2024 FA Cup statistics from all across Nigeria and noted that Lagos State stood out with a colossal entry of 80 clubs, which he believes buttresses his forecast.
The owner of 36 Lion FC added that the presence of more clubs from the nation’s commercial capital in the NNL and others in the third cadre Nationwide League One (NLO) also reflect the impending domination of Nigeria’s top flight league by Lagos-based clubs.
He also gave kudos to ace journalist and broadcaster, Godwin Enakhena for aiding the ascent of the state into a pivotal place in the Nigerian league, first with Mountain of Fire Ministries (MFM) FC and now Sporting Lagos FC.
Liameed projected: “The future is bright, very bright. If you look at us in Lagos, we don’t just wait and expect a light to appear at the end of the tunnel. We create our own light.
“Look at our spread. We had 80 teams that competed in this year’s FA Cup. The next state to us that has the most is maybe 11. That is about one-eighth of what we had here.
The way we are going, we will soon get more premiership clubs in Lagos, trust me.
“We know the story of MFM and how they got relegated. But, before you know it, the same person that brought up MFM, Godwin Enakhena, also got Sporting Lagos to the NPFL.
“I believe that, in two to three years, we should be seeing Ikorodu City in the NPFL. We should be seeing Inter Lagos. We should be seeing Madiba. So on and so forth.
Football in Lagos is bright, and it will always be bright “