Posted by Kickoff Nigeria on
KICK OFF has exclusively learned that the Nigeria Football Association (NFA) have signed a new deal with kit manufacturers adidas worth a ground-breaking 15 million Euros (about 2.5 billion naira).
KICK OFF has exclusively learned that the Nigeria Football Association (NFA) have signed a new deal with kit manufacturers adidas worth a ground-breaking 15 million Euros (about 2.5 billion naira).
The kit sponsorship agreement with the country's national teams will be for five years and takes effect from January 2005.
It also replaces an earlier agreement worth 100,000 US dollars (about 14 million naira) and which was signed last year.
That deal generated a huge uproar after it was revealed that another kit sponsor, Hummel of Denmark, had offered a much better contract to the perennially cash-strapped NFA.
A further breakdown of the sponsorship deal shows that the cash consideration is 5 million Euros (over 800 million naira) while the value of equipment adidas will supply to the country's teams is put at 10 million Euros.
The Flying Eagles will be one of the first teams to financially benefit from this kit sponsorship deal through a performance-based bonus following their fine run at Netherlands 2005, where they went all the way to the final of the Under-20 tournament.
The deal was signed during the Fifa World Youth Championship in The Netherlands last month.
New special kit designs for the Eagles to both the Nations Cup and the World Cup are also expected to be unveiled by the time the senior national team qualifies for the championships.
Officials have kept sealed lips over this mega sponsorship believed to be the biggest ever in Nigerian sport.
However, a top official who would not want his name in print simply told KICK OFF: 'This is historic. Among other things, it will provide the NFA with that much needed financial independence we have all been craving for.
'For instance, we can now employ a top foreign coach ourselves, not running to the ministry or other sponsors in that regard."
adidas replaces Nike, who have kitted the national teams since after the 1994 World Cup in the United States of America.
The German kit manufacturers had first sponsored Nigeria at both the 1994 Nations Cup in Tunisia and the '94 World Cup.