#3 The 2009 case of Nigerian age fraud
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Age fraud has been a consistent problem in football for a long time and the topic again re-emerged in 2014 after Lazio signed 17-year-old Cameroonian midfielder Joseph Minala. According to the Senegalese media, the player was actually 41 years old and was just one of many African players who claimed they were younger in order to gain a competitive advantage.
While the claim was strongly denied by both the player and his club, age fraud in African football has been a problem for many years with Nigeria having the worst reputation for hiding the age of its players.
In 1988, Nigeria was banned from all FIFA competitions after it was revealed that three of the players in the country's Olympic squad had different birth dates compared to dates used in previous tournaments.
But the biggest case of age fraud in Nigeria was discovered just six years ago in the build up to the 2009 Under-17 World Cup. After FIFA announced that it would be taking new measures to test the age of players in the tournament, Nigeria dropped 15 players from its squad.
The prevalence of age fraud in the country has been admitted by several Nigerian officials since, and in 2010 the former head of the Nigerian Football Federation said in regards to age fraud, “We always cheats, it’s a fact”.
According to Nigerian blogger George Omonya, the problem of age fraud in the country stems from the relative simpleness of changing a player’s age. The blogger said that anyone can walk into any immigration office and for a small fee, receive a new passport with a new name and birthplace. This can all be done within a few hours.
While it’s unlikely many players within Europe are actually older than they state, it remains a massive topic of conversation and is something clubs are constantly aware of when scouting new players.
