Coach Izilien remembers their 1969 game with Santos FC. Godwin Izilien, a former coach of the Golden Eaglets and Super Falcons, has talked about how he stopped Pele and feared Santos FC from doing much damage to the Midwest-selected team when they played at Ogbe Stadium in Benin City in 1969.
When Pele led Santos FC to Benin City on the invitation of the then-military governor of the Midwestern region, Lieutenant Colonel Samuel Ogbemudia, the Nigerian civil war was in full swing and the Midwest and Eastern regions were being torn apart by the sounds of bombs, grenade, and gunfire.
Speaking on the STVSports show, Izilien, who coached the Super Falcons to the African Women’s Championship (AWC) title in Johannesburg in 2004, said that the 1969 game gave him a strong idea of how skilled and disciplined Pele was as a footballer. “The match was scheduled for 3.30 p.m., but the stadium was opened at 10:00 a.m.,” Izilien recalls. “Ogbe Stadium was newly commissioned then, and it was filled up at 2 p.m. with a lot of people stuck outside the stadium as they were unable to get in.
Mr. Izilien said; “I also remember then that some football fans came from neighboring towns such as Abudu, Agbor, Asaba, Onisha, and some other regions controlled by the Biafran soldiers. They sneaked into Benin City to watch Pele and his Santos FC play. Even before the match started, many of the fans had already concluded that Pele would demolish the selected Midwestern team by as many as 10-0.
Izilien continues: “I was the captain of the Midwestern selected team, and under five minutes, we were 2-0 down. We came up with a trick, pretending that one of our players was injured. That gave me an opportunity to counsel my teammates. I told them that if we should allow Santos FC to continue that way, we may concede 20-0 and above. I told them that the only way to avoid a heavy defeat in front of our fans was to pick on the Brazilian players one by one.
“But the biggest challenge was, who will mark a dangerous Pele? As the team captain, I volunteered to mark him (Pele). I devised a means to go hard on him within the limits of the game’s laws because Pele was very skilled. At a point, Pele became angry with some of my tackles, and he came on me speaking Portuguese while I was speaking English. People started laughing because I didn’t understand what he was saying.
“The game continued, and Pele had a pass, and I gave him another hard tackle. Both of us went down. The referee, Augustine Alisha, came and warned both of us. This, in a way, reduced the pressure on us. Pele went back to his own half of the field and started passing the ball around instead of attacking us. We were very happy. The first half ended 2-0 in Santos’ favor.
“In the second half, we were lucky to have a free kick, and ‘Warri boy’ Titus Okere, scored to make it 2-1. That brought joy to everyone inside Ogbe Stadium. The match was historic in that it brought so many people together for the first time since the civil war began in 1967. We forgot all our problems at that moment. Before Pele left the pitch in the 76th minute, he dribbled his way into our defensive area and clipped the ball above my head. If I had used force on the ball, it would have been my own goal. What I did was control the ball into a corner, and Pele was shocked to see an intelligent local player in an obscure area like Benin at the time. As he made his way out of the pitch, Pele threw his jersey on me in appreciation of my intellectual display of football. We later met in the house of the Esama, Chief Gabriel Igbinedion.”
Following Pele’s passing, Izilien expressed his sadness. “I feel sad that we lost a natural footballer. Pele was a gifted player, and he was never involved in any drug scandal throughout his playing career.”
Pele, who led Brazil to three World Cup victories, passed away on December 29, 2022, and was buried yesterday.
Your reaction