And The Show Begins

For 45 days, starting from 1 July, 30 aspiring footballers will be camped for trials of the maiden edition of Football Challenge with Fash, a talent hunt football reality television show.

If the last few weeks have provided huge challenges for the over 18,000 footballers that applied for the contest, the coming weeks promise even more. Though a total of 30 footballers will be in the camp, only half that number will make the final list. While in camp, the contestants in this novel football developmental initiative, sponsored by Oceanic International Bank plc, will go through different drills under the tutelage of top-rated coaches. The footballers will be exposed to the various training techniques on video, board and field. Using these video training methods, the contestants will watch clips and learn techniques required for defensive and attacking play as well as different formations. After about ten days, the contestants will start executing different tasks based on what they have learnt. The tasks are of two types: individual and group.  The individual tasks feature one-on-one challenges. For example, an attacker will take on a defender. This will also include penalty shoot-outs, throw-ins, goalkeeping and dribbling. Others are defensive skills, free-kicks, soccer video game and ball control. At the end of this stage, which comes within the first 10 days of the competition, 10 contestants will be evicted, leaving the remaining 20 to move to the next stage, which is the group task.Tasks in this stage will see contestants divided into four teams to play in a five-a-side competition. The contestants will decide the composition of their teams, the name for the team as well as the captains. With the formation of the teams, the four teams will engage themselves in a round-robin contest that will see the winners of each group playing in the final to determine the winner of the mini-competition. Viewers will vote the best 15 players in the contest that will form Fash F.C. To decide who becomes the Most Valuable Player, MVP, of the contest, Fash F.C. will play against a known team. This will allow the viewing audience to vote for the star of the contest.  As part of activities slated to honour retiring Austin Jay-Jay Okocha, the contestants will play against Olorogun Babes, an Ughelli-based team, in the curtain raiser for the World Selected against African XI, Okocha’s testimonial to be held on 26 June, at the Warri City Stadium.