John Mikel Obi

By Preye Campbell

The world is in a huge mess at the moment. If one could see the future, one could have prayed for a different 2020.

The coronavirus pandemic has ruptured virtually everything that concerns life, not even leaving out the round leather game.

A host of footballing activities have been suspended with some, like the Euro 2020 now postponed to 2021.

Currently, footballing activities have been thrown into the dungeon and no one is sure as to when things will return to normalcy.

But, safety is key and ensuring people’s lives are secure should be the ultimate goal of any organization or authority and that explains the wise decisions made by The English Premier League, Italian Serie A and Spanish La Liga amongst others.

But the Turkish Super Lig?

Last weekend witnessed match week 26’s fixtures in action in Turkey and in this worrying period, eyebrows were raised as to what was in the mind of the ‘numero-unos’ of the Turkish League and why domestic footballing action is still allowed in a country that was hit with 22 new cases of the virus just 24 hours ago.

It wasn’t a surprise then when Nigeria’s football prince, John Obi Mikel, voiced out his concerns at the Super Lig authorities for allowing football to continue.

With the calamitous increase of this virus, even footballers are not left out of the ‘party’. The recent death of the 21 year old Spanish player-coach, Francisco Garcia should have caused unrest on a number of people associated with the sport and should allay any hope that somehow, football personalities will be protected.

At this period, EVERYTHING is needed to make sure people are safe and that the beautiful game can continue when all of this malady has evaporated.

No reason has been given for the latest update on Mikel parting ways with the Super Lig leaders, Trabzonspor but in all honesty, can the reason be far-fetched?

In this vein, let me be the first person then to congratulate John Obi Mikel on his decision to quit the Turkish league.