Iliman Ndiaye, Harlem Globetrotters-Style Skills and Revealing Football Stats

YOU’RE TELLING US THERE’S A CHANCE?

If you haven’t seen the footage of Iliman Ndiaye performing a reverse bouncing nutmeg at Everton’s training ground, it’s a good watch. In executing a move so nasty that it would have been appropriate at a Harlem Globetrotters exhibition match, the skill immediately shut down what was meant to be a informal game to wrap up what had been – up to that point – an revealing conversation about how Sunday league footballers can earn a second chance after being let go from professional academies.

Ndiaye, who featured in non-league games directly before being picked up by Sheffield United at 19, is ideally suited to discuss this topic. “Avoid dwelling on the rejection and one day your luck is going to arrive,” he informed a young player shortly before using said impressive trick on his victim, in doing so perfectly illustrating the difference between Premier League and amateur footballers he had been attempting to dispel.

Ndiaye is far from the only professional footballer to go slightly overboard. A younger Michael Owen cheerfully overwhelming a young shot-stopper in front of a annoyed Neville Southall is undoubtedly the prime example in this particular niche – but the former Liverpool man is far from the only offender. Both Christian Eriksen and Shinji Kagawa have made young children cry with a series of brutal nutmegs, although it’s thought that the latter was at least motivated by the Japanese player’s social media regretful message – “setbacks build character” – and the associated label of #friendship.

Kagawa’s former Dortmund teammates Lukasz Piszczek, Jakub Blaszczykowski and Nuri Sahin at least had the good grace to lose their match against 100 children when the three competed during the interval of their final match for BVB. A Real Madrid XI that featured Cristiano Ronaldo and Xabi Alonso were more competitive when they took on 109 Chinese kids in a comparable scenario. But returning to the beginning, it’s calculated that only 180 of the 1.5 million boys currently playing competitive youth leagues in England will ever appear in the Premier League, a sobering statistic for young players across the country.

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QUOTE OF THE DAY

“The game guided me but it never abandoned me because I never gave up on my goal. I went from place to place. The love of football drives you. I couldn’t always see where it was taking me. But today I have the understanding” – head coach Veljko Paunovic takes time out from his training to discuss his career.

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