Is it the classy rock-solid defender, Florence Omagbemi? A player who captained the team to glory on home soil in the maiden African women cup of Nations,in 1998 and subsequently led the team to an outstanding haul of victories in a storied career that spanned over a decade. She is referred to as a first amongst equals, furthermore she made history in 2016 as the first woman to win the Women’s Africa Cup of Nations both as a player and coach. Resident in the USA, Omagbemi is still actively involved with the game as a coach/consultant. Or is the battling midfield gem Stella Mbachu. Apart from being a crucial piece of that 1998 winning team, Mbachu was for many years an important main-stay in the Super Falcons and it's many successes till she bowed out of the game in 2014. She is a coach now too.
Or is it the mercurial tall gangling terrifying striker, Mercy Akide. She's the first recipient of the African Women’s Player of the Year, in 2001, "Marvellous Mercy" as she was so called by admirers, made it a habit to score important goals throughout her very impactful career with the Super Falcons. She won the Women’s AFCON three times including 1998,2002 and 20004. She's actively involved with the game as women's football coach at college level in USA. Then a little later, up came the legend, Perpetua Nkwocha, who is regarded as Africa's greatest female footballer ever being the most decorated female player of all time– she won the Africa Women footballer of the year honours 4 times– in 2004, 2005, 2010 and 2011. She also won the MVP award in CAF’s African women championship in 2002, 2004 and 2006. Many football analysts have described Nkwocha as possessing the female-esque combined skills of Austin Jay-jay Okocha and the ball intelligence of Nwankwo Kanu, two of Nigeria’s greatest men football stars of all time. At the peak of her career in 2004, Nkwocha became the only African woman to ever be listed in FIFA – XI – bringing the continent’s women football to true world reckon for the first time. In that same year, she set a record, scoring 9 goals in the African Women Football Championship and going on to win both the Most Valuable Player (MVP) and the Highest Goal Scorer (HGS) awards at thesame championship.
I just listed above arguably the most outstanding former Nigerian national female football players.
Fast forward to today and you will find a certain footballing beauty rise head and shoulders above the rest and not just because she stands a tall 5ft 8(173m) in height. In 2020,she was awarded the Confederation of African(CAF) player of the year, this being the 4th time she has won this award– that's a tie with Perpetua Nwokocha.
This player born 9th October 1994,in Ikorodu, Lagos State, took to football quite early; right after her Secondary Schoolchool education, she kicked-off her career at FC Robo,in the Nigerian Lower Division. She played there from from 2009 to 2013 before being signed up Rivers Angels,of elite Nigerian female league.
It was during her stay at Rivers Angels, that Asisat began to be noticed, with her sleek and controlled brand of football, more akin to men. Nigeria therefore came calling for her to represent the country in the 2014 FIFA U-20 Women's World Cup in Canada. She grabbed this opportunity by the scruff of the neck and stood out in that tournament– emerging top scorer( with seven goals) and was named the Player of the Tournament. Her performance thus propelled Nigeria into finishing the tournament as runners-up.
She is none other than the tall elegant, Asisat Lamina Oshoala MON . That "MON" is a stately title in Nigeria known as, "Member of the Order of the Niger". It is usually given to a select few of very accomplished statesmen, especially politicians, but her accomplishments in sports earned her such a rare honour. Super!
After that aforementioned stellar performance in Canada, she was at it again in 2014, as she was named the best player and second top goalscorer with the Super Falcons team who took top honours in the 2014 African Women’s Championship.
By that time, Asisat was already a crowd-pleasing football artiste; and was becoming a popular name both in Nigeria and abroad.
Her blistering outing in Canada and Namibia continued to turn heads. She was thus called-up by Edwin Okon (the then Super Falcons coach) to the Super Falcons squad for the FIFA Women’s World Cup, hosted by Canada in 2015. She went on to have a remarkable outing once again. Or does she just love Canada? [smiles]
In this tournament she opened her goalscoring account when she notched Nigeria’s second goal in a decent 3–3 draw against Sweden. Overall, it was rather unfortunate that the Super Falcons couldn't advance beyond the group stage. However, Oshoala had emphatically made her presence known.
On the ascendancy, Oshoala was signed by the Liverpool Ladies of England on January 23rd, 2015 before representing Nigeria in July 2015.
This move to Liverpool made Asisat become the first African Female Footballer to play in the Women’s Super League,the English top tier competition for professional women football.
Oshoala’s impressive first season in England saw her win the BBC Women’s Footballer of the Year award in 2015.[Oh well,it has nothing to do with Canada afterall].
A knee injury set-back creeped in and kept her out of action for two months of the 2015 season. Liverpool thus finished seventh of eight teams, though they won the league in the previous season.
Her gorgeous performances for Liverpool when fit, already endeared her to Arsenal and quickly activating Asisat’s release clause at Liverpool, she became a player for the female side of the North London club in 2016. She was prolific here too that clubs were falling head over heels for her.
Only a year later, Chinese club Dalian Quanjian F.C. officially signed Oshoala from Arsenal. It was a short spell in China because her talent was so sought after and because she craved to play for the best. However, she finished as top scorer in China in the 2017 Superleague and it was such an outstanding spell in China.
Now in 2019, the big fish came calling– Spanish club FC Barcelona Femení signed Oshoala on a loan deal until the end of the season. She scored her first league goal against Rayo. Weeks later she scored in the attendance record-breaking match against Atletico Femeni at the Wanda Metropolitano. Now Spain began to feel the heat waves of this superlative footballing prodigy.
Barcelona bulldozed their way to the UEFA Women's Champions League final in 2019. It was a painful 4–1 defeat to Lyon, but it was Oshoala who scored Barcelona’s only goal; thereby becoming both the first-ever Barcelona Femení player and African player to ever score in a UEFA Women’s Champions League Final, apart from being the first Nigerian to score in any UEFA Champions League final, men or women.
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She had more than earned her badges and the Camp Nou side announced later in 2019 that Oshoala has signed the dotted lines for full transfer till 2022.
So far, Asisat has done exceptionally well for both club and country. Also it has been a whole world of blessing she has been to her family, a lady who was raised in the slum, playing in third-rate pitches and not encouraged by her parents in her early days(she had to play on the street secretly to avoid her parent's eyes). The parents were finally won over to her side when she won the aforementioned golden boot in that 2014,U-20 World Cup. She’s currently the captain of the Super Falcons after Desire Oparanozie was stripped off the captaincy.
Asisat is the most clinical finisher Nigeria boasts now, very dangerous in the opposition box. She has amazing movement off the ball and keen to be involved in build-up play too. She is a constant threat to defenders with her sublime dribbling skills and a certain alertness she has to pick on any slight chance to snatch the ball and attempt to score; that's apart from the aerial threat her tall frame affords her.
She has since erected a football foundation in Lagos, Nigeria,training and servicing the needs for girls who wish to play professionally.
Super Falcons captain, Asisat Oshoala, has been named as the best Nigerian female footballer in history and fittingly so too. The former Arsenal and Liverpool ladies’ forward was named the winner in a poll set by the Confederation of African Football (CAF) on FIFA in which fans were asked to pick their best Nigerian female footballer.
To put this in perspective, footballing greats like Mercy Akide, Perpetua Nkocha and Cynthia Uwak, were also nominated. Oshoala got 53 percent of the total votes to top the chat and Perpetua Nkwocha came second with 31 percent.
Talking about the European Champion's league, this past season Barcelona Femení went one better than the previous season above were they lost to Lyon in the final. The Four-time African Women's Footballer of the Year once again glittered, this time as a second-half substitute, as Barcelona Femení crushed Chelsea 4-0 to win their first Women's Champions League title in the Swedish city of Gothenburg.
The Nigerian captain, even had a last-gasp goal chalked off for offside as her side's triumph brought an end to Lyon's monopoly of five Champions League titles in a row. This makes her the first African woman to win the Champions League. That's perhaps the brightest trophy of her already trophy laden career. By May 2021 she had netted 33 goals for Barca in 32 matches. Amazing! Her 15 goals last season helped Barcelona Femení to also retain the Primera División crown, to add to the Spanish Cup and Super Cup.
What an example to follow she leaves us with and at age 26, she even still has time to do much much more. Tributes to Asisat Lemina Oshoala.
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Culled from mine- link
cheerfully...
