The World Cup jackpot the Eagles would have missed

By Ifeanyi Ibeh

For many Nigerians, it would had been an immeasurable disaster had the Super Eagles failed to qualify for next year’s FIFA World Cup in South Africa.

For them, especially the core optimists among the over 140 million “coaches” in the country who never lost hope up to last weekend’s game against Kenya, it would have been another round of four years emotional torture after experiencing the bitter scenario of following proceedings from TV sets while the likes of “little” Togo and Angola took their places among the world football’s selected few in Germany.

Not only did the Togolese and the Angolans feature at football’s biggest stage, they also smiled to the banks. Thanks to the “jackpot” that the World Cup has become for participating teams.

Big pay day

Months before the commencement of the World Cup in Germany, advance payments of one million Swiss Francs (N147 million) was given to each association taking part in the World Cup as a contribution towards preparing their teams for the tournament.

In addition to that, each association got two million Swiss Francs (N294 million) per match in the first round which amounts to a total of seven million Swiss Francs (N1 billion) for every team that failed to advance beyond the first round in Germany such as Togo,

Angola, Tunisia and Cote d’Ivoire.

Teams that lost in the round of sixteen, like Ghana, earned an additional 1.5million Swiss Francs thus bringing their total prize money to 8.5 million Swiss Francs (N1.24 billion) while the losing quarter-finalists each picked up 11.5million Swiss Francs (N1.69 billion).

Italy were given 24.5million Swiss Francs (N3.6 billion) for winning the World Cup, runners-up France got 22.5million Swiss Francs (N3.3 billion) while third and fourth placed finishers,

Germany and Portugal, each got 21.5million Swiss Francs (N3,16 billion) for their efforts.

FIFA also bore the travelling costs for each delegation comprising 45 people as well as partial costs of accommodation while 15million Swiss Francs (N2.2 billion) was also set aside from the total prize money of 315million Swiss Francs (N44.1 billion) for an insurance fund intended to compensate clubs, through the participating associations, had any of their players suffered injuries during the tournament.

Once compensation had been paid out, the balance was distributed among the participating associations.


More money, more problems

The total amount disbursed at the last World Cup was significantly higher when compared to what was given out to participating teams at the 2002 edition co-hosted by South Korea and Japan and it is expected to be higher ahead of South Africa 2010.

Although in 2002, each participating team, as was the case in 2006, received a million Swiss Francs to cover its preparation costs, only 200,750,000 Swiss Francs (N29.5 billion), 50 percent less than the Germany 2006 sum, was shared out on a performance scale among the participating teams with eventual champions, Brazil, receiving 12,400,000 Swiss Francs (N1.8 billion).

Little wonder the Tunisian players cried their hearts out at the end of proceedings in Maputo, and our darling Super Eagles shed tears of joy at the end of last weekend’s game in Nairobi while the Egyptians played as if their entire lives depended on the outcome of their encounter against Algeria.

One only hopes that the largesse from FIFA doesn’t cause a split between the Nigeria Football Federation and the players as was the case in Trinidad and Tobago where the players are still awaiting their share of the bounty from their countryman, FIFA Vice-president Jack Warner, four years after making their World Cup debut.