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The Ikenne-based Club have continued to set the bar as far as youth development in football is concerned.

Nigeria is a country beaming with undeniable football talent. A look at names that have been exported in the last three decades such as Jay-Jay Okocha, Kanu Nwankwo, Taribo West, Victor Ikpeba, Sunday Oliseh, Obafemi Martins, Mikel John Obi, Odion Ighalo, Wilfred Ndidi among many others, is a testament to that.

As much as this has been a blessing to the country’s image, it paints a stark reality when one realises that professional clubs in the country do not have solid structures that develop these players from youth into senior players which is the practice in much of the other side of the world.

In Nigeria, professional clubs do not have structures that should be basic and standard. They rather rely on purchasing well-developed players from academies to get right into the action and once they are noticed on the big stage, scouts come knocking. Even if these clubs have academies, they are not well run and don’t have many players moving up the ranks.

There’s however one professional club doing things different in Remo Stars.

The club’s origins began in Lagos as a recreational and development outfit for youths before it morphed into FC Dender following impressive outings in grassroots tournaments. The club’s profile continued to steadily rise and this led to more rebranding of its name from Remoland and finally Remo Stars, with its new base in Ikenne.

Remo were making giant strides in the Nigeria National League, the country’s second-tier, and made history when they gained promotion to top-tier, the Nigeria Professional Football League, in 2017 for the first time. It created lots of buzz as it made them along with Mountain of Fire FC, FC Ifeanyi Ubah and ABS FC as the privately-run clubs in the top-flight, a good sign for a league that is largely filled with clubs that are practically an extension of the state government civil service.

Joy quickly ended in agony for the Sky Blues as they were instantly relegated to the NNL after a string of poor results and finished rock bottom. Undeterred, Remo immediately got NPFL promotion back in 2019, but again, they got relegated, finishing last in Group A of the abridged league format.

After two seasons in the NNL, Remo Stars are back in the NPFL for the third time in their short history and it’s a sign of how well they are improving, a claim held by their former coach Fatai Osho, who led them to their second NPFL promotion.

“They’ve been improving every day because they have the best structure in the country. In form of facilities, they will rank as one of the best in Africa. You need to be at their new stadium to see how well the club has progressed,” Osho told Pulse in an exclusive interview.

“Most of the boys you see that gained promotion to the NPFL, they have been working with that coach [Daniel Ogunmodede] for almost five years from the Under-13s and upwards. That is the right step to take in the country. You take these players right from secondary school and we have a lot of primary school students as well that are in the Under-10s and look at the progression.”

Ogunmodede oversaw a youth system that produced names such as Morgan Agbeko, Junior Nduka, Qudus Akanni and Olamilekan Adedayo, Marcus Abraham, all of them moving up the ranks to the senior team and playing a prominent role in Remo finishing top of the NNL group, five points clear of Bendel Insurance and securing their promotion status in the playoffs. Some of the players like Abraham and Mathias Adah have since moved abroad.

Remo Stars has a strong affiliation with Portuguese second-tier side C.D. Feirense, of which Remo owner Kunle Soname, is the chairman and majority stakeholder. Some of Remo’s players have benefited from the link. Remo also has a thriving Under-19 side that competes in the Nationwide League One, the third tier of football in Nigeria and they narrowly missed out on promotion to the NNL by finishing second in their group.

They recently finished as league winners of the eight-team Creative Championship and runners-up of the cup contest. This is a tournament that is comprised of teams fielding much older players. Going that far against such calibre of teams is proof of the quality of football and coaching at the Remo Stars academy.

Not forgetting that Remo has its own stadium with a geotech hybrid synthetic pitch in Ikenne, after years of tenancy in Agege, Lagos and Sagamu, Ijebu-Ode in Ogun State. The stadium will have a total of four pitches as well as accommodation facilities for the team and visiting sides as well.

These achievements have pleased Osho - who Ogunmodede worked with in the past, and insists other clubs should look to Remo’s kind of thriving model.

“For them to use those set of players, 90% of whom will play in the NPFL, it is really a good thing for football in our country,” the ex-Enyimba boss continued.

“The coach [Ogunmodede] has done a wonderful job and he should be commended and I think others can emulate that.”

Ogunmodede will not continue with Remo into the new NPFL season after getting a coaching role with Feirense in Portugal. From Nduka Ugbade to Osho and then Ogunmodede, it is a sign that Remo invests in good youth coaches of which the results have spoken.

In the latest development, former Enyimba and Lobi Stars coach Gbenga Ogunbote, has been unveiled as the new Remo boss. It has raised some concern about whether he will be able to save the Sky Blues from relegation at the third time of asking. After all, Osho couldn’t do it the first time, neither could two-time NPFL winner Kennedy Boboye do it the second time. Ogunbote is very much capable of doing it as he has a track record of saving clubs from the drop. These include Shooting Stars twice and the now-defunct Sharks FC.

Remo Stars will mean serious business this time and Mr Soname has already set a target of winning the NPFL in 2024.

For the vision the business tycoon has set from the very beginning, his aims are very possible. It is similar to what Vichai Srivaddhanaprabha set when he purchased Leicester City in 2010 while still in the Championship and the results have been so impressive, the late Thai billionaire would never have imagined.

This is not saying Remo’s trajectory will be like Leicester’s, but it signifies the club owners have deliberate targets and will invest in all that is necessary to make them thrive in the long term, rather than have a haphazard approach to objectives as seen with the majorly government-run clubs.

Remo Stars are doing things differently and it is not only working for them but also reinventing the image of football in Nigeria, and this is something other clubs should follow.

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Kunle is an avid writer with interest in topics on sports, politics and health. His articles have featured in Goal.com, Opera News and Vanguard News. He holds a Bachelors and Masters degree in International Relations and is an advocate for people living with Hydrocephalus and other neurological conditions.

Follow him on Twitter: @kfayiga

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