Nigerian coach uses football to fight drugs | OneFootball

A Nigerian of Lebanese origin and a football star in the conservative northern region of Nigeria, Hidaa Ghaddar is unconventional, but her approach may be exactly what is needed in Kano, a city mired in drug addiction and unemployment.

“Drug abuse and football are not compatible. You either do this or you do that,” she told AFP, referring to her Breakthrough Football academy, founded two years ago with the aim of developing future talent for foreign clubs.

The 27-year-old has become a local celebrity for being the country’s only female coach of an all-male team, defying cultural norms.

See also: All Gazeta Esportiva news Gazeta Esportiva’s YouTube channel Follow Gazeta Esportiva on Instagram Join Gazeta Esportiva’s WhatsApp channel She is more than qualified for the sporting side of her job, but her methodology also seeks to help Nigerian authorities in their fight against drugs, amid a toxic mix of substance abuse, crime and political violence.

Kano, the largest city in northern Nigeria, has the country’s second-highest rate of illicit substance use, according to the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency.

Rampant unemployment has pushed young people in this city of five million into drugs and crime, a situation exploited by politicians, who hire them as thugs to intimidate their opponents, according to researchers.

The state’s unemployment rate is 7.6%, above the national average of 5.3%. But the share of young people in Kano state who are not in education, employment or training rises to 12.5%.

Nigeria also lacks treatment and rehabilitation centers, and drugs smuggled into Europe are increasingly ending up on the local market.

“Playing football in itself helps these players avoid all that,” Ghaddar argues.

Her training sessions are accompanied by special attention to “nutrition, sleep, hydration, and maintaining a good lifestyle,” says the coach, dressed in a black hijab and blue cleats.

Love of football

Born into a Lebanese family of factory owners in Kano, Ghaddar started playing football at age five “with (her) brother and his friends.”

At 16, she moved to Lebanon to attend university. But her dreams of becoming a star on the pitch were cut short by four consecutive knee injuries and five surgeries, which forced her to give up her playing career at 18.

When she returned to Nigeria, she began offering female players the football opportunity she never had.

At first, she doubted whether her plan to create an academy would work, since there were no standout athletes in the city, where traditions keep most women away from sports. Even so, she opened the academy with six students, and that number soon grew to 63.

“I was afraid of everything… of being a woman wearing a hijab, of coming to the racetrack, of training here in the sand in front of men,” Ghaddar says.

Her academy now provides its players with football gear as well as accommodation, to help them focus on the sport.

They are also enrolled in high school and receive English lessons twice a week.

Those who do not wish to go to university are hired to work in the bakeries and soft drink factories owned by Ghaddar’s family.

“These boys are like my family,” the coach says proudly, explaining that she wanted to “build something different” so that everyone could “have a better life.”

“We pray and train to achieve our biggest dream: signing with foreign clubs in Europe or anywhere else,” says Ali Mustafa Ahmad Musa, a 15-year-old boy after training.

*with AFP content

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇧🇷 here.