It is painful that I am now writing about former Green Eagles/Super Eagles goalkeeper, Peter Rufai, popularly called Dodo Mayana by his team mates, fans and admirers alike in past tense.
I wrote Green Eagles/Super Eagles because he was privileged to play with the two generations of players spanning from 1981 to 1998 when he finally called it quits.
He told the story how he started with the Christian Chukwu-captained squad after their 1980 Africa Cup of Nations victory in Lagos.
As the youngest of the goalkeepers who included legends like Peter Fregene, Patrick Okala and Best Ogedegbe, he stated in an interview how he would carry their boots to the bus taking them for training sessions.
He added that during friendly matches, he usually put into practice what he learnt from watching his seniors do in goal.
And that may have impacted his performance in later years especially during the second AFCON victory in Tunisia in 1994.
His exit gave room to the emergence of Ike Shorunmu, Abiodun Baruwa and Willy Opara who were chosen for the France ’98 World Cup. Fate however, had a cruel blow on Shorunmu as he got injured shortly before the competition.
I was with the players during the 1994 AFCON victory in Tunisia but didn’t get that close to Rufai. He was in-between the radicals and conservatives and was rather admired for his jokes.
That was when I first heard about his moniker, Dodo Mayana. I never knew what it meant nor how it came about until I listened to the interview he granted some years back a few days ago..
His mien and composure in camp, both during trainings and matches helped him a great deal. No wonder he kept a clean slate during the group stage matches and quarter finals in Tunisia and did well at Nigeria’s first World Cup in the USA in 1994.
Rufai was captain when the Super Eagles were to defend their AFCON title in South Africa in 1996 but the dream was truncated by the ill-advised boycott of the competition ordered by then military regime of General Sani Abacha.
Dodo Mayana said that boycott culminated in the end of some players’ international careers, as they, including himself, retired from the national team.
His exit gave room to the emergence of Ike Shorunmu, Abiodun Baruwa and Willy Opara who were chosen for the France ’98 World Cup. Fate however, had a cruel blow on Shorunmu as he got injured shortly before the competition.
Then NFA Chairman, retired Col. Abdulmumini Aminu was in a quandary how they would take only Baruwa and Opara to the World Cup. That was how Rufai’s name popped up but none of the NFA officials knew how to locate him as the season had ended.
Rufai
Aminu had a discussion with the trio of Felix Okugbe (now late), Osaretin Emuze and I, who were with the team in the Swiss holiday town of Morschach where they were training and Okugbe offered to help contact some of Rufai’s friends.
After a few phone calls, Rufai who was then with Deportivo de La Coruna was found to be holidaying somewhere in Spain.
Col. Aminu told him of the emergency at hand and the need for him to join the team immediately. Rufai replied that he was on holiday and hadn’t trained for a while but will be on his way.
He turned up just before the team left for Amsterdam for the scheduled friendly match against the Netherlands. Rufai’s match rustiness and the fact that some defenders were also nursing various degrees of injuries showed in the match as the Super Eagles lost 1-5.
It was in that state the team left for Paris a few days to the commencement of the World Cup and their first game against Spain.
It wasn’t only Nigerians who were worried about the 5-1 bashing by the Netherlands but some of their foreign admirers.
One of these foreign admirers was incidentally a Dutch legend, Ruud Gullit who had just ended his stint as Chelsea manager that year.
I ran into him at the Media Centre of the France ’98 World Cup and he immediately recognized me through the Nigerian colours I was putting on.
After exchanging pleasantries with me, he asked me what was wrong with the Super Eagles that they played so badly the previous day. I just told him the team was plagued with injuries.
When in their first match against Spain and Fernando Hierro drew the first blood in the 21st minute, our fears of a woeful outing came staring us in the face. One thing with the Super Eagles is that they tend to surprise their fans each time they were written off.
And it played out again in that opening match against Spain that had world class players like their goalkeeper, Andoni Zubizarreta and Luis Enrique, current coach of Paris Saint Germain, PSG who are battling Chelsea FC in the final of the 2025 FIFA Club World Cup today.
The Super Eagles went on to beat Bulgaria, lost to Paraguay but still topped their group and qualified for the round of 16. They eventually lost to Denmark because of distractions over agitation for unpaid allowances which dragged far into the night, hours to the crucial match.
Nigeria crashed out of the World Cup. That too marked Rufai’s second retirement from the Super Eagles. He led a quiet life after retirement from active football in 2000 till his demise penultimate Thursday.
His death so touched Dr Michael Omolayole that he has advocated for health insurance by the National Sports Commission for sports men and women to help cater for them after retirement.
The post The Dodo Mayana I knew, by Patrick Omorodion appeared first on Vanguard News.