As a child, I didn’t really like attending classes. I preferred chopping slaps from Coach ND in training. I don’t know why, but that man just loved to train me. Come rain, come shine, he would organise personal training sessions for me. The fun part was that I was actually learning and getting better; the not-so-fun part was that for every goal I conceded, I got five slaps. I laugh every time I remember it. 

My parents didn’t want me to play that much football, so I always had punishment waiting for me at home, too. But did I still sneak out every day to train? Yes. And when I got to secondary school, did I join the team that used to train near my school and begin to represent them in competitions? Also yes. 

As time went on, my parents started allowing me to train a bit more. Today, a one-week trip to Abuja for a competition; tomorrow, a three-day scouting competition out of state. My dad still preferred me to stay in the shop and sell biscuits, but I was a very stubborn child. It was only football. 

When my mum was leaving my dad in, she had told me months ahead that we were going. Me, her and my younger sisters. My older brothers would stay with my dad in Benin. She prepared me, told me to say my goodbyes, pack my bags, everything. I can still remember how much she cried when the day came and I told her I wasn’t leaving. You know how you can cry until you are weak and can’t even cry anymore. I don’t like thinking about it. It was like I betrayed her. But the reason I didn’t follow her was because we had a scouting competition in a few weeks. It was a big opportunity for me, you know. Today, I can’t even remember how it went, but yes, this is how I started living with my dad and his second wife. 

It was not great. 

You know how the story goes naw. I more or less turned into a house boy — washed all the clothes all the time, wasn’t given food when everyone was eating. But as a Benin Boy that I am, I survived. I either got money from my dad to buy food or just sorted myself — a friend’s house, a neighbour’s shop on credit, anything. As long as I was training, I was okay. 

That team I joined near my school, the one I chose to stay in Benin for? My coach there was Nnamdi Onuigbo. Not Coach ND oh — this was a whole different man entirely. I was doing well with the team until, at some point, he left to coach a team we'd once played against in Abuja. After he left, the team was no longer as good as it used to be. I also didn't find many other good clubs to play in Benin. It felt like my opportunities in Benin were drying up.

One time, when he was visiting, he came to meet my dad with a proposal: He needed three players in his team, and he wanted me to be one of them. This was not a one-week thing oh. I would leave Benin and move to Abuja, full time, and maybe only go home for Christmas. My dad told him he thought it was a good idea, but when he left, told me I wasn’t going. As Coach Nnamdi called and applied pressure, I also begged my dad that I wanted to go. It’s not like I was doing well in school or happy to be living with him anyways. So, he agreed. But the condition was that he wasn’t going to contribute a dime to whatever I was doing. 

No wahala. I be area boy. 

I was a child, but I was tough. If it was hustle it took to go to Abuja and continue training with Coach Nnamdi, I would do it. 

So, to make money, I had an idea: be a bus conductor. I’d seen it many times in Benin: young boys helping older bus drivers get passengers. And because I was a young footballer, me and my teammates moved around in groups a lot, so drivers knew us as footballers. I went to the park, met one of the drivers I knew knew me and told him the situation. He was happy to help me. 

₦700. That’s how much he paid me every day. I wore face caps just in case someone who knew me or my parents saw me. 

I did this for, let’s say, one week, and then found a hotel that was undergoing renovations near my house, and helped them carry blocks for a few days too. In total, both jobs gave me about ₦12,000. That was going to be enough to travel, but I still needed one more thing, so I sold my phone for ₦7,000 to buy gloves. 

Yes, gloves. 

Up until this point in my life, I was strictly a goalkeeper. In fact, I was a goalkeeper until only a few months before Sporting Lagos scouted me, but don’t let me jump the story. Back to Benin. 

₦11,000 took me to Abuja. I dropped at Kubwa bus stop, which was close to the camp. I’d been there before, and Coach was expecting me, so I just walked the rest of the way. My new life started just like that. 

The first few months were terrible. I reacted to the water, and I was sick a lot because of the big fat mosquitoes. But after three months, I was fine. Then we started training properly. They had first put me with the u-13’s, but they said I was too good, so they moved me to u-19’s. Brother, I chased a lot of goalkeepers away from joining that club. It’s not as if I was fantastic at stopping shots or tall or anything, but I was so good with my feet. When new keepers came for trials with the club, they would first be made to watch me and then asked a simple question: “Are you better than him with your feet?” Most of the time, they were honest and said no, so they just left. That doesn’t mean it was easy, though. Playing with boys much much older than me meant I was facing shots that I wasn’t meant to be facing. Look at this wrist. It has been dislocated before because of a shot. See my shoulders — I’ve fallen on them and injured them so so many times. So many bruises, so many injuries. But I was good. We played FA Cup, state league, trials, and scouting competitions, and I was always the starting goalkeeper. 

One time in late 2022, we were playing in the FDC Vista scouting competition. It was two games, and in the second game, our right back got injured. We didn’t have an extra right back, but we had an extra goalkeeper, so Coach said, “Haruna, you’re good with your feet. Play right back.” 

I was selected as the right back of the tournament. With just one game. 

I didn’t make the final cut, but my coach thought, since I’d played well as an outfielder, he would try me there more often. So, while I was in goal for the U-19 team, I started playing as a DM for the U-13s. The change was big. Me that I sold my phone for gloves, I was now an outfield player. 

Three months later, Sporting Lagos scouted me — as a defender. 

I didn’t want to leave, though. I didn’t want to leave the friends (or family, really) that I’d made in Abuja and then just come to Lagos where I didn’t know anybody. Plus, I’d been selected again for the FDC Vista scouting thing, so if I made it, I was going to Russia. So I told some of the older players to go and ask Coach Nnamdi to tell Sporting Lagos I didn’t want to come. When he asked me why, I said it was because I didn’t want to leave my friends. He said, “Leave your friends and fight for your career. This is a good move for you. If you pass the scouting competition, sure, you’ll go to Russia. But if not, you should go to Sporting Lagos.”

I didn’t pass the scouting competition again. So I came to Lagos. Me, Mukhtar, Odinaka, Yusuf, Favour Bala (Now at Inter Lagos), and Vincent. The first group of players to join the Sporting Academy. And you see those friends I wanted to reject Sporting for? Not one of them even texted me when I left. Coming to Sporting was the best decision I’ve ever made. 

Guess what happened when I got to Lagos? FDC Vista was scouting in Lagos, and when they saw me training with Sporting, they said, “Aren’t you the same Haruna Abubakar we’ve selected twice?”

This time, they said they were going to take me for sure. I still had to play a game, but I won’t lie to you, I was not exceptional. I didn’t even play as well as I did in the first two scouting games. This injury on my stomach, I got it five minutes into the game, and they wanted me to come off, but I played through it. I know they didn’t select me because of that game, but I won’t complain. I mean, I went to Russia. 

Three times now, when I've had to go to Europe and had to get consent letters from my parents, they've been shocked. Happy but shocked. The same parents who once punished me for sneaking out to train were now signing consent forms for me to travel to Europe. Football has gone from being my rebellion to becoming my family's hope. And this is one of the reasons I have to make it. I still love my parents so much, and I want to make them proud. We didn't grow up having a lot. Things are still not the best. But if I make it, maybe things can change.

Russia was 2024. I stayed there for three months. In that time, no fewer than 15 players were told to leave. They didn’t waste time in sending people back home. But I stayed. I believed I had done enough for a contract. Two days before my visa expired, just as I was getting ready to renew it with two other players, they told me it was time to return to Nigeria. The two other players are still there.

They didn’t say I played badly. I don’t know exactly what happened. Maybe it was a decision behind the scenes, maybe something changed. I’ve thought about it a lot, but what I’ve come to believe is this: whatever happened was for my good. And I’m still here, still fighting, still moving forward.

The rest of 2024 moved fast. We reached the final of the TCC Cup,  I captained the team for our Gothia win in Sweden, and Coach Nnamdi who now coaches in Sweden, came to say hi. That was nice. He’s like a father to me now.

These days, I train with the first team. I’ve not made my debut yet, but I’ve made the bench. I still play for and captain the Academy when they have games. I’m still growing as a player, learning how to play my role as good as I should. I’m learning how to go forward and create chances. I’m getting better. I know my career is still going to be brilliant. 

My parents and siblings need me to succeed. I need to succeed. Because one day, I will have my own family, and my children cannot go through the same things I did.

We're going for Gothia again this year. I'm captain again. We will show the world that we're here again.