If Thompson Usiyen had not migrated to the USA in 1976 but had waited to play during the last qualifier against Tunisia in 1977 for the 1978 World Cup, every Nigerian would have known the mercurial talent of the young goal-scoring machine at the time. Nigerians believed we would have beaten Tunisia at home and qualified for the FIFA World Cup for the first time.
The place of Nigerian football in the world of football would never have been the same. The birth of global football superstars and the growth of the football industry in Nigeria would have come much earlier than in 1994.
Thompson’s sudden exit from Nigeria’s national team truncated that great movement to Nigeria’s appearance at a World Cup. It also cost him a fantastic career in World football. His skills and goal-scoring ability would have been in the class of the biggest and best players in the world at the time if he had not left the Nigerian team. He was that good. His ‘setback’ was that he went to America hoping to advance his football.
Although he came from America on one occasion to play with the Green Eagles during the 3rd All-African Games in Algiers in 1978, the standard of American football had blunted his skills; it was apparent he was not the same player that left two years before.
After Algiers ’78, Thompson never came back to play again in the Nigerian national team. Effectively, his movement to America also marked the end of his international football career. It is about the same for a legion of other exceptionally gifted Nigerian footballers who were also lured with scholarships to get an education in the USA and to represent their American Colleges and Universities in soccer, as Americans refer to football. Only four others in this vast army of footballers could return and play in Nigeria’s national team again during or after their studies.
The first was short-lived. Andrew Atuegbu returned in 1976 and joined the European national team in preparation for the Montreal Olympic Games of 1976. Although he played a few friendly matches during the European tour before heading for Canada for the games that were eventually boycotted, he was clearly not quite as sharp as before he left for the USA. After the Olympics, he was not invited any more.
Godwin Odiye also left in 1977. He was invited back to play with the Green Eagles during the 1980 African Cup of Nations due to his reputation as a formidable centre-half. Unlike Andrew and Thompson before him, his game was blunted by America, and he was not the same player that left three years before.
