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History19 July 2026
1979, in their own words
Forty-seven years on, the surviving members of the title-winning squad remember the season that took the Nigerian league trophy to Benin City.
They still meet, some of them, on the last Saturday of the month.
Before the run
Nobody expected it. The squad had finished mid-table the season before and lost two of its most experienced defenders over the summer.
We were not the best team in the country that year. We were the team that wanted it in April, and by then everyone else was tired.
The turn
The change came in a run of five games across three weeks, all away from home, all won. By the time the side came back to Benin the city had decided the title was theirs.
- Kadiri Ikhana marshalling the middle
- A defence that conceded twice in eleven games
- A crowd that, by the final month, would not fit in the ground
The trophy has been back once since, in a different competition and a different century. Ask any of them whether they expect to see the league title again in their lifetime and you get the same answer: a shrug, then a smile, then why not.
