For the Adesina family, both at home and in the Diaspora, the recent death of former national goalkeeper, Best Ogedegbe, was like a personal loss. When the news broke that he had gone the way of all flesh after an eye surgery at the University College Hospital (UCH), Ibadan, we exchanged text messages, electronic mails, and phone calls, lamenting the development. It was as if we were directly affected. Yes, we were directly affected, as Best was one of us. How? I’ll tell you the story.
After a teaching career that saw him traversing Murumba College, Ile-Ife, Oriwu College, Ikorodu, Lagos, Saint Charles Grammar School, Osogbo, and Notre Dame College, Usi-Ekiti, my father retired as a school principal in 1971. He went back to his hometown, Ipetumodu, in the then Ife Division of the Western State. There, he established a farm, a hotel, and other kinds of businesses. He traded under the name Olugbon (God is the wise one).
The seven Adesina children therefore grew up, knowing their mother as the proprietress of Olugbon Hotel. And one night in October, 1975, blasts from the horns of a massive bus, not a common sight in that area in those days, broke the serenity of the entire neighbourhood. The hotel’s gates were flung open, and the vehicle lumbered in. That was the beginning of what has become a lifelong relationship between the Adesina family, and some determined young men, who were members of the then IICC Shooting Stars football team. They had qualified to compete in what was then called the African Cup Winners Cup, and their mentor, Chief Lekan Salami, had sought a quiet place, out of the hustle and bustle of town, out of all the distractions and temptations of city life, to hide them away in preparation.
I was a starry-eyed young boy, only in my first year in secondary school then. In fact, in a book I wrote later in 1992, Segun Odegbami wrote thus in the Foreword: “Sixteen years seems like a long time. It is not! Or wasn’t it only yesterday that I came into contact with that skinny young boy whose bright, ever inquisitive eyes followed us around in that serene atmosphere of Ipetumodu?”
Yes, before they all became international stars in soccer, I knew Segun Odegbami, Muda Lawal, Best Ogedegbe, Kunle Awesu, Sam Ojebode (the skipper) Otolorin Moses, Idowu Otubusin (Slow Poison), and, indeed, all the players of the then IICC Shooting Stars who won Nigeria’s first international club soccer trophy in 1976.
Best Ogedegbe died recently at 55. That means he was only 21 years old when I first knew him. And he was a typical young man. Happy-go-lucky, slightly boastful (even though pleasantly so), and of course, with the typical roving eyes of a young man. I knew some of the best-kept secrets of one of the best goalkeepers this nation has produced. Best Ogedegbe recruited me as an accomplice in some of his antics.
Best and Laide Alli had joined IICC from a club called Spitfire, so they were particularly close. Alli had taken me under his wings, so, if I was not in school, I was likely in his hotel room. And Best was equally always there.
I’m sure Mrs Folasade Ogedegbe would not mind my revealing this, even as she mourns her late husband. And of course, any young man who did not do similar things should cast the first stone. There was a young lady in our neighbourhood that Best had sighted, and he wanted to strike a relationship with. Discipline was tight under the watchful eyes of the coaches – Alan Hawkes, Ayo Adeniji, Jossy Lad, Amusa Adisa (Popo), and of course, Adegboye Onigbinde, who popped into camp once in a while. So, what was the best way for Best to accomplish his aim? He recruited the young, innocent boy. Me. That was how I became a messenger of love. I carried notes and messages between Best and his beau.
It was like a comedy of errors the first time I did it. Best and Joe Appiah, a Ghanaian defender with the team, looked very alike to me. They were only few days old in camp, and when the lady told me that Best could visit later in the night, I delivered the message to Joe Appiah. It was a mystified Appiah, who had seen Best talking with me earlier, that eventually piloted me to the goalkeeper’s room.
Camp life was generally peaceful, but I’ll never forget the day Best and Otolorin Moses had a bust-up. The team normally trained on the pitch of the then University of Ife, which was about 15 minutes drive away. On the way back one evening, the two players sat near each other. One wanted the window flung wide open, the other wanted it closed. A rift ensued, and by the time they alighted at the hotel, Best charged at Otolorin Moses. If you knew the latter, he was a real man-mountain, while Best was quite skinny in comparison. It was like David versus Goliath. As the other players tried to separate them, it was curiously Best that refused to be pacified. He kept screaming: ma na e flat, ma na e flat. (I’ll beat you flat). He spoke Yoruba well, but with an accent of the Bendel man that he was. All the officials intervened, but Best would not listen. He insisted he must beat up Otolorin that night, and at a point, he scooped gravel from the ground, and threw in Otolorin’s face. But the latter maintained his cool, which I found very impressive, being also a young boy who would never let a good fight pass in school.
Eventually, my father, a naturally private man, had to step out of the house to intervene. He invited Best and Otolorin into his sitting room, and asked them to maintain the peace. It took a while, but truce was eventually brokered. Otolorin drank the bottle of Coke he was offered, Best only sipped a little, and left the rest. He was still in a pugnacious mood, but he later let well be.
I can’t recall any other serious fight in the next three years that the team came in and out of camp at my mum’s hotel. But can I forget this hilarious one? Otolorin Moses, Best, Muda Lawal (they called him Shiru Jojo) and some others, were at the bar. Otolorin had bought fried snail, which he was munching. Muda asked for some, which naturally should have been passed through Best, who sat in the middle. But Muda told Otolorin, “don’t pass it through Best, he would eat it. Throw it to me.”
True, the snail went into the air. But it never got to its destination. Midway in its flight, Best jumped up, and with his open mouth, snapped up the snail. All the players around shouted, Bestsito, which was the way they fondly called him. He then beat his chest, and jocularly said; “I’m not Best for nothing.”
I have loads and loads of stories to tell about this goalkeeper who displaced Zion Ogunfehinmi from the number one position. Zion had been injured early in the competition, and Best came in as substitute. He never again gave up the number one position till he retired many years later. He was in goal throughout the campaign that saw the team beat Kenya Breweries, Bata Bullets of Malawi, Rokana United of Zambia, Zamalek of Egypt, and Tonnere Kalara of Cameroun, to lift the Cup Winners Cup. Best still went ahead to displace the legendary Emmanuel Okala as Green Eagles goalkeeper, helping the national team to win the Cup of Nations in 1980.
In my book, The Shooting Stars: Golden Era of a Soccer Team, I have chronicled some of the experiences of those days. Odegbami, in the Foreword, had remarked: “The memories of that period are special. They remain indelible, permanently etched in the minds of those of us who relate that period to some of the best in our lives.”
More than 30 years later, the Adesinas are still in touch with some of those football stars. A good number of them came when I presented the book I wrote in 1992. Each time I meet Odegbami now, he never forgets to ask after my mum, and each time he would promise to visit Ipetumodu one day to greet her. The last time I relayed this message to her, my mum laughed, and said she hoped Segun (as she calls him) would one day come, after all the promises.
Best was not the first person we’ve lost in that glorious team. Coach Ayo Adeniji is long gone. Folorunsho Gambari (Gambus) was perhaps the first player to die. Also in the list are Abbai Adeleye (I never forget the 30 kobo he gave me, which ended in the hands of the kulikuli seller across my school gate), Kunle Awesu, Muda Lawal, and Kafaru Alabi (Kalala). About Kalala, let me for the sake of his memory continue to keep some secrets we shared, which saw him beating the eagle-eyed officials almost every night to do some Nicodemus activities outside the camp. I was also a drafted as an accomplice.
Yet another secret. In the semi-final of that competition, IICC had been beaten 2-0 by Zamalek in Egypt. The second leg was scheduled for Liberty Stadium, Ibadan. It was on the very day of the match that they left the camp in Ipetumodu. But they went with something I had sourced for them, at the instigation of Idowu Otubusin (Slow Poison). I know when that thing was deployed during the match, because I saw the immediate result as I watched the game on television. What was the thing? Well, you are becoming too inquisitive. And it is not from my mouth that anyone will hear that the king’s mother is a witch.
I can only pray that Best and all the other shooting stars that have shot ahead will rest in peace. If they ever play soccer at that other side, their places in the first eleven have been guaranteed.
