Uganda: English Premier League to Help Repackage Nigerian Soccer

Kampala

LAGOS - The English Premier League has agreed a deal to help Nigeria repackage its soccer league and make it more commercially viable.

Premier League board chairman David Richards said the deal was an opportunity for the Premier League to repay Nigerian football, which had contributed immensely to the English game, local media reported on Monday.

"We have benefited and we will continue to benefit from (the) Nigeria Football League," Richards told reporters in the Nigerian capital Abuja at the end of a two-day visit.

"We see our cooperation as a way of giving something back," he added, according to the Leadership newspaper.

Some of the Premier League's leading scorers are Nigerians, including Yakubu Aiyegbeni of Middlesbrough, Nwankwo Kanu of Portsmouth and Newcastle United's Obafemi Martins.

Under the agreement, the Premier League will train Nigerian officials to improve the technical standard and organisation of the domestic league. The Premier League has also sealed separate deals with sponsors to pay referees in the 20-team league, provide balls and broadcast matches in England.

The agreement is designed to make clubs in the cash-strapped league self-sufficient and free them from government management, Richards said.

"It is going to be a gradual thing, ultimately government will not be running the clubs," he said.

Reuters