The Journey of Professional Football Career: Challenges and Reflections

Abstract

The problem of corruption and mismanagement of state resources by governments in Africa has impoverished the continent, throwing many families into daunting challenges. The youth, consequently, is underpowered and unproductive to self-support their own social lives. To accomplish their dreams, some youths turn to social groups through football. This study analyzes the profile of a boy enduring several challenges in search for survival at a tender age. The social activity of football eventually supported the boy’s reintegration in the streets. Relying on social integration theory and interviews, this study exposes how African youths attempt to achieve self-reliance through football in the communities. Findings reveal how the boy’s experiences on the street and in Europe reshaped his livelihood and support for society. Further description of the boy’s lived experience and his socioeconomic contributions to society is outlined.

Keywords

abandoned boy football migration professional player social integration survival strategy

Introduction

The popularity of football in most African countries has made it the pride and passion of many communities. Many African young people, both male and female, are aspiring to play for their national teams. But even more popular than local and national football is European football. The mediatization of European leagues and their economic potentials for footballers continue to attract young talents from Africa. The promises of a lucrative career that Europe offers budding footballers are an explanation of why some young people abandon schooling and concentrate all their productive endeavors on full-time football with the ambition of moving abroad to play professionally for a living (Esson, 2013a, 2015). The ambition of a football career abroad is also influenced by the limited opportunities at home for the development of their talents (Acheampong, 2020). Many young people recognize this limitation, causing them to choose to neglect their education to enable them focus solely on football for survival, as Esson (2015) identified in his studies.

In many African communities, most parents consider education as a privilege that can make one become somebody, that is, a person of status and respect. Education, for most parents, makes a child responsible, matured, independent, knowledgeable, and capable of taking care of others in the future (Langevang, 2008). As a result of this perception, many parents place a high premium on education (Van der Meij & Darby, 2014) and this shows why parents, family members, and the community are eager to always support the education of children, albeit financial constraints. Considering the value of education for families, relatives, and extended families in Ghanaian communities, this study analyzes the exceptional case of a 10-year-old boy named Nii Odartey Lamptey who, through no fault of his abandoned school, got integrated into a social group by relying on his football talent to survive in the community. Indeed, Nii Odartey Lamptey was touted by many football pundits, Pelé of Brazil, who predicted him as the next “Pele.” The wonder kid is the first Ghanaian migrant player to join RSC Anderlecht, Belgium, in 1989. The study engages with the social integration (SI) theory of the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development (UNRISD, 1994) which provides relevant information to understand the abandoned boy’s life narratives that reflect different perspectives on migration, education, social reintegration, professional football, and investments. It again contributes to explaining how his SI became key to overcoming his social constraints in the streets (Lutz, 2017). The theory and its analytical tools are important for understanding the street boy’s strong desire to abandon his formal education, which is generally viewed as the vehicle to success, to pursue financial success elsewhere: a professional career in football abroad.

The study makes a new contribution to the existing literature by analyzing the lived experiences both at home and abroad of its subject as a strategy to explaining the positive effects these experiences have had on his socioeconomic investments in the communities. Furthermore, it provides scholars with knowledge about the concept of SI, which can create opportunities for individuals when appropriately adopted. The article is presented as follows: First, it clarifies the way Nii Odartey Lamptey maneuvered various social obstacles on the streets to pursue his football dream. This betters our understanding of the risky adventure embarked on and how he carefully adapted to his social group through an integrated approach to survival. Second, it addresses how Nii Odartey Lamptey could migrate to play professionally abroad without informing his friends and social groups. Finally, the conclusion discusses the lessons from his professional experience that changed his perception of education in life.

Biography of Nii Odartey Lamptey

Nii Odartey Lamptey (born 1974) is a former Ghanaian international footballer and, currently, the owner of GlowLamp International School, which comprises a school complex and football academy. Nii Odartey Lamptey was born in Accra and later relocated to Kumasi to live with his father and stepmother after his parents’ separation. As a young boy, Nii Odartey Lamptey was particularly talented, and he showed immense promise as a footballer. However, his dreams as a young footballer were unfulfilled, largely due to exploitation by football agents (Darby, 2010). At age 8, two colts¹ teams fought to take possession of his football talent and prospects. This resulted in conflict over the boy’s talent, with each team wrangling for possession of his talents. His mother, with no knowledge about football, to avoid these conflicts, sent him to his father in Kumasi, the second largest city of Ghana. In Kumasi, Nii Odartey Lamptey joined a colts team in the Moslem community after his father ousted him from home.

Nii Odartey Lamptey’s exploits during the FIFA U17 World Cup in Italy 1991 were rated ahead of Alessandro Del Piero’s, as well as other future stars when he won the Player of the Tournament Award. From there, Nii Odartey Lamptey became a teenage superstar and went on later to play professional football for over 17 years in 10 different foreign countries, starting from RSC Anderlecht (Belgium), PSV Eindhoven (Holland), Aston Villa and Coventry City FC (England), Vicenza Calcio (Italy), Boca Junior (Argentina), Ankaraguru (Turkey), Uniao Leiria (Portugal), Greuther Furth (Germany), Shandong Luneng (China) and Al-Nasr (Dubai). Nii Odartey Lamptey retired by playing for Kumasi Asante Kotoko SC, Ghana, one of the respected and phenomenal clubs in the history of African football. Getting the opportunity to end his active playing career in Ghana was a dream-come-true after he played for Asante Kotoko SC in the domestic league.

Nii Odartey Lamptey played in all the categories of Ghana national youth teams through to the senior team. Presently, he is a licensed football coach and a director of both GlowLamp Football Academy and GlowLamp School Complex in Ghana. In the late 1980s, Nii Odartey Lamptey’s sterling performance at the FIFA World U16 competition in Scotland (1989) caught the attention of some European clubs that wanted his service. It is this turning point that is of interest to this study, and the study hopes to unravel how Nii Odartey Lamptey could achieve his football dream as a street boy through an analysis of his fascinating narratives. The experiences of Nii Odartey Lamptey are relevant for many African youths who may have a similar intention of migrating to Europe in pursuit of a career in football.

Theoretical Framework

Overview of SI

The UNRISD (1994) concept of social integration inspired this study. The UNRISD recognizes the concept of SI as an established pattern of human relations in any given society. The subjective nature of the concept could make it complex because it conveys different meanings to diverse individuals based on how they can use it to their benefits. Largely, there are three different dimensions to the concept, that is, three different viewpoints adopted by people. For the first group of people, SI has an inclusionary goal, indicating equal opportunities and rights for all human beings. In this case, becoming more integrated implies improving lifetime via having the chance to take part in societal activities and using it to accomplish one’s own goals, that is, what someone is enabled to do and to be, whether or not someone chooses to do so (Lutz, 2017). To others, however, increasing integration has a negative effect, because they imagine its characteristics of undesirable obligations of uniformity affecting one’s life. Still, others view the term as not necessarily suggesting a positive or a negative state. Here, it means both instances can be integrated depending on how a person uses it to pursue their goals. So, using the negative approach could be useful depending on one’s situation and the challenges to be overcome yet; others may hold different views on it.

Primarily, one’s perspective of SI could be either positive or negative. With respect to the achievement of goals, the individual’s ability to achieve their goals using either positive or negative or both approaches of the UNRISD concept of SI may depend on the kind of situation one has to sacrifice for survival in that peculiar situation. Thus, it can lead a person to relinquish their defensive tendencies in exchange for respect (Blau, 1960) to survive wherever they may find themselves.

The concept of SI is an important analytical concept in this study. The study moves beyond mere social inclusion to uncover how Nii Odartey Lamptey managed to reintegrate into a social group in a Moslem-dominated community after his ejection from the father’s residence. A thorough analysis of UNRISD’s concept of SI explains the issues raised in the qualitative life story of Nii Odartey Lamptey’s experiences along his football career paths. In the UNRISD’s notion of SI, they appreciate the basic roles of families and communities in the eradication of bad behaviors in society. The notion also holds that proper socialization cannot be easily achieved when things are left to only those concerned to handle it, as was the case for Nii Odartey Lamptey.

To UNRISD, promoting pleasant interaction and solidarity at all levels in the society can minimize issues of child neglect and abuse. Such behaviors can lead individuals to find cooperation or support outside their confinement via involvement with others who may provide a source of comfort and well-being for them (Loring, 1988). This may improve one’s participation in society that can support their striving to accomplish their goals (Lutz, 2017). Nii Odartey Lamptey’s story was characterized by the absence of some lack of interaction and solidarity early in his life. First, his parents were separated early on in his life. After their separation, the typical extended family assistance that takes place in Ghanaian social settings did not happen for Nii Odartey Lamptey. The conduct of both his parents and his extended family contradicts social norms and cultural values in Ghanaian communities (Acheampong, 2020). Nii Odartey Lamptey was left in limbo and had to adopt a survival strategy or inclusiveness to achieve his football career dreams. How he achieved this inclusiveness and integration is analyzed through his life narratives. It is important to note that Nii Odartey Lamptey’s disconnection from his parents provided him with an opportunity to establish social relations that supported his social inclusion, solidarity, and a sense of belonging to live and achieve his desired goals in the community.

The UNRISD (1994) made several attempts to improve on characteristics of SI that have been an issue as they have not achieved equal rights and opportunities for all. That is, respecting diversity is one of the central policy questions of the 20th century. Cultural diversity is one of the most complexes because it is considered to have both negative and positive goal for people. Some of these issues make it difficult to delete the disadvantaged people because it may lead to bad policies. There is a risk involved in focusing slightly on the ordinary goal of SI that will make disintegration unwanted by definition. Analysis of some views on the notion of SI makes the UNRISD confirm the complexity of having a common definition for it.

This study takes advantage of SI’s notion of using social inclusion to improve life chances and to support the achievement of ultimate goals to examine how Nii Lamptey could adopt any of the three different approaches of SI (UNRISD,1994) as a strategy to support the achievement of his football career abroad. Through the analysis of Nii Odartey Lamptey’s SI processes and experiences, theoretical and practical lessons can be provided for African youths who may be desperate to achieve social upward mobility via migrating abroad because of the limited opportunities at home (Acheampong et al., 2020). A table is attached that explains the UNRISD concept of SI and the study’s contribution (Table 1).

Table 1.

Summary of the Study’s Contribution to the UNRISD (1994) Concept of Social Integration.

Indicators/elements	UNRISD (1994)	Complexity
Positive impact	- To accomplish one’s own goals - Freedom - Cultural diversity - Equal chance and equal rights for all	- Group dynamics - Group identity (food, shelter, clothing, etc.) - Opportunity to achieve one’s goal - Vary support, solidarity, a sense of belonging, comfort, and so on - Can make good decisions - No restrictions
Negative impact	- Unwanted obligations of uniformity affecting one’s life - Child neglect (family/parents) - Cultural diversity	- Overdependence on social can limit dreams - Learn new things to survive - Endure hardship to achieve a goal - Group protection in exchange for basic life support like food and shelter - Can make bad decisions - Vulnerable to social vices
Both (positive and negative)	- It can be integrated depending on how a person uses it to pursue their goals - For a good or bad purpose - Cultural diversity	- Make decisions to suit their immediate conditions - Combine both to achieve a goal - Can conceal relevant information from the group - Survival strategy to release dreams
Remarks	- Difficulty in finding a common definition	- Study contributions reaffirm it

Source. Acheampong (2020).

Note. UNRISD = United Nations Research Institute for Social Development.

Method

This study uses an exploratory approach to gain an understanding into Nii Odartey Lamptey’s survival on the streets while he searched for a professional football career abroad. The single-case method was adopted because it is a unique way of getting information for the purpose of understanding real, lived experiences. It may not lend itself to developing generalizations and theories, but it is convenient for understanding lived experiences. In addition, the single-case method permits researchers to provide a better view and a better explanation of case studies (Tsoukas, 2009). After the decision had been made to use the single-case method, there was still the decision on what specific narrative to choose. Nii Odartey Lamptey’s narrative is an important choice because of the significant lessons it can offer youths in Africa who dream of pursuing football careers abroad. The study does not discount the nobility and necessity of seeking better career opportunities overseas. The argument, however, is that the desperate use of obscene means to move abroad in search of a career can have serious consequences on teenage lives. Such a move has the capacity to truncate the development of a young person’s human capital for their community and country. In gathering research material, data gathered from secondary sources such as sports websites, academic journals, magazines, a document of UNRISD, among others, supported the interview narrations. The author conducted two separate interviews in 9 weeks to firm up the data on Nii Odartey Lamptey’s migration project. The fieldwork took place in Accra, Ghana, for more than 5 months with visits to some of the interviewee’s socioeconomic projects in the communities. The first interview was on April 26, 2015, where the former player provided information on his football career, ranging from his childhood to his career with the national youth team of Ghana before getting the opportunity to move abroad. The second interview was face-to-face to authenticate certain information by probing further on the generated ideas from the previous discussions on the telephone (Kvale & Brinkmann, 2015).

Before the first interview, the author had informal discussions with the player (Nii Odartey Lamptey) when they met at Accra Sports stadium to watch a football match. The focus of the interview was to find out how he was transferring his football knowledge and experience to the youth. The second interview essentially provided a clear understanding of his football itinerary and his postplaying career transition. This provided a better appreciation and explanation of the issues raised in the first interview. This interview took place at one of his residences in Accra, Ghana, on August 8, 2015, which is approximately 100 m from his School Complex. It offered the author an opportunity to inspect the facilities at his school while a conversation on his vision for the graduates. He shared his intention to establish a private university in the future for easier progression of students after the completion of their Senior High education. Interviews were recorded and transcribed, which was helpful in generating themes that are presented in the findings. Nii Odartey Lamptey’s life story, together with secondary data, contributes to enriching the study’s analysis.

Results and Discussion

Life on the Streets

Nii Odartey Lamptey’s parents got separated at an early age. He stayed with his mother and the rest of his siblings in Accra, and when Nii Odartey Lamptey was 8 years old, he joined his father in Kumasi. He lost contact with his mother and his siblings, and not long after moving in with his father, he was ejected from his father’s residence. Living on the streets was a struggle for Nii Odartey Lamptey, primarily because his biological mother was not aware of his ejection from his father’s residence and he had no way of getting in touch with her and the rest of his siblings. In the streets, Nii Odartey Lamptey, a non-Muslim, adopted a strategy to survive by integrating into a Moslem-dominated community through the use of his football talent as he played for a colts club.

It was his talent as a footballer that served as the grease to his easy integration into this social group. The group fostered his passion to pursue his professional football dream (Lutz, 2017) while benefiting from Nii Odartey Lamptey’s talent and potentials. The social interactions in this group motivated Odartey’s conversion to Islam. Nii Odartey Lamptey recapped how he could not resist the allure of the group. He said, “when we go to the mosque and they were praying, I would be waiting for them and finally, they convinced me to become a Moslem.”² Nii Odartey Lamptey had always dreamed of a career in football. It was, however, not his intention to attain that dream on the streets. Yet, the circumstances of life meant he had no options than to use that social process to pursue his passion for football in the locality. The group was his defense and protector (Blau, 1960), his source of shelter, and the provider of his meals. Becoming a Muslim then was a reasonable next step for him as joining their religion offered him a form of headrest to survive in the streets. Essentially, Nii Odartey Lamptey’s new-found social context supported his integration through the provision of some of his basic needs, including food and shelter, as well as a sense of belonging. His SI improved his living conditions in the streets because he had the opportunity to participate in societal activities that contributed to supporting his football dreams abroad, thus enabling him to become what he wanted to be (Lutz, 2017).

What can be seen from Nii Odartey Lamptey’s example is a positive aspect of SI as he strived to survive in the Moslem community. From his narration, the street life gave him more comfort than he would have had at home with his father and his stepmother. For instance, Nii Odartey Lamptey reiterated some challenges he endured amid ill treatment at his father’s residence before relocating to the streets for social support:

I will go and play football and return, I will not get food to eat; I will sleep under a car; I will be beaten and have to fetch water to fill a barrel before I will get some food to eat. Sometimes I have to pound “fufu”³ before I get some to eat. In the colts’ team, I have to also work for them before they will feed me. The challenges were too much.⁴

Nii Odartey Lamptey’s ill-treatment from his family came to an end when he moved to the streets. On the streets, he was not mishandled and maltreated. On the streets and in his new-found Moslem community, he was without restriction and could, therefore, take decisions on his own. As much as Nii Odartey Lamptey thrived on the freedom of the streets, he also recounts how easy it was to be influenced by his social group, his conversion to Islam one of the many examples of peer influence. Despite the challenges that confronted him, Nii Odartey Lamptey remained resolute, doing everything possible to develop his football talent through the informal way of training with the colts club that is mostly managed by football enthusiasts in the locality (Acheampong et al., 2020; Acheampong, 2020).

Nii Odartey Lamptey never sat in a classroom, but he was always available for sporting activities organized by the schools in the community. He was not a student, yet he turned up at sporting competitions and immersed himself in the activities. His desire to play football would not be quenched. Nii Odartey Lamptey’s participation in school competitions was often aided by those students who on their time off from school were members of his street’s colts team. It goes without saying that participating in a school competition as a nonstudent count as unacceptable behavior. Yet, Nii Odartey Lamptey managed to outwit the system and often participated as a registered student in school sporting competitions. Nii Odartey Lamptey’s dalliance with school sporting activities points to the cracks that existed in the screening process, making it possible for unqualified people to compete for schools without proper documentation. In the 1980s, this practice was quite the norm as technology was unsophisticated and less accessible. The laxity of the screening process and Nii Odartey Lamptey’s ability to outwit teachers and school authorities may have reinforced his understanding of formal basic education as a mere formality, interspersed with brief moments of real excitement and sports. He recapped, “school was just a name for me and when it was football time I will just go and play.”⁵ His resilient attitude got him integrated through complex positive freedom to participate in society, which provided a sense of belonging and personal identity with the social group (Lutz, 2017).

Like most young people, Nii Odartey Lamptey may have delighted in outwitting teachers without carefully reflecting on the consequences of his actions. His behavior was bolstered by how his social group accepted him even more into their fold because of those antics. Despite the fact that school-age going children had, and still have, access to free universal formal education in the Ghanaian communities (Rolleston & Okech, 2008), he did not enroll. He participated in school activities, but only if it was sports. He stopped short of enrolling into the academic section of school. Although he was without restrictions and had the freedom to make his own decisions, for some reason, he did not enroll into school because he could not have the support.

While Nii Odartey Lamptey’s passion for football was positively nurtured by his social group, he was unfortunately exposed to some of the negative effects of SI, such as cheating. Not only did he lose out on formal education, he also picked up social vice on the streets. Today, he has put his vices behind him, but his lack of formal education caused him to make many wrong choices along his football career paths. The astuteness that comes with formal education, which he lacked, opened him up to exploitation by talent scouts, many of whom exploited his football talent and potentials to achieve their own selfish sporting goals in the communities. His lack of formal education was compounded by his lack of parental support. Not only did he lack parental support, but also lacked the support of his extended family. In many African countries, Ghana included, the role of the extended family is very significant in the development and upbringing of a family member (see Kӧnig & de Regt, 2010; Acheampong, 2020; Van der Meij & Darby, 2017). Most often, the extended family did not encompass only relatives but other “good” people within the communities that tend to show compassion and deliberate care to provide support where necessary (Acheampong, 2020). All these opportunities eluded him as none of them bothered to look for his whereabouts. In the place of his family, he was accepted into a social group in the streets, which supported his survival at that tender age. His new environment gave him a sense of belonging, yet he had to suffer several challenges during his career development, making him vulnerable to all kinds of social vices in the community. Thus, Nii Odartey Lamptey’s SI can be considered negative here because of its effects on his personality (UNRISD, 1994). On the contrary, the positive aspects of his SI cannot be ignored, as it supported him to survive on the streets. In Ghanaian communities, a young person who pursues only a career in football to the detriment of one’s formal education is rendered in local parlance as kobolo.⁶ This was exactly how Nii Odartey Lamptey was referred to because he could not have the chance to access formal education in the communities.

Nii Odartey Lamptey’s life on the street continued as it had been, but at a point, he realized that overdependence on the social group could hamper his dreams, so pushed himself up to accomplish his football ambitions. From his lived experience, both home and abroad, Nii Odartey Lamptey recounts that he could count on having only 30% support from his social relations in the form of coaches, agents, and social groups to provide him with food, shelter, and clothing, while 70% came from his efforts and determination. Thus, in playing professionally abroad, one has to be determined, devoted, and sufficiently driven to mobilize their network-based itinerary (Acheampong et al., 2020) to support the accomplishment of their football dreams. There was limited support from his social group, and no support whatsoever from his extended families. His extended family never bothered to look for him but when he became financially successful, they showed up to make unnecessary demands on him, demands they claimed needed to be met so that they can cover up their shame in a society that has increasingly become showier and more ostentatious. His family invoked the name of culture in their demands on Nii Odartey Lamptey, and how many Ghanaians can say no to their culture being used as a call on them to rise to familial responsibility? Nii Odartey Lamptey’s experience highlights this negative aspect of the Ghanaian culture which silences victims. In this silencing, injustice is perpetuated, and the aggrieved can never seek redress because of the cultural value and social norm of “leaving it to God” (Acheampong et al., 2020). Consequently, such a culture has constraints on people’s behaviors as well, which North (1991) identified as an informal institution that controls their conducts in the local communities.

Nii Odartey Lamptey’s talent and prospects could fit into today’s perspective of sport for development as suggested by some scholars (Esson, 2016; Hartmann & Kwauk, 2011). However, he could not benefit from the above concept. Had he benefited from it, who knows if it could not have gotten him into a school to support his football dream and formal education? His challenges aside, and through the intervention of his social group, Nii Odartey Lamptey got exposed and became visible to the Ghana national U16 team handlers (Agergaard & Engh, 2013) who eventually invited him for camping. In effect, the social group via the colts club created an opportunity for him to be scouted for the Ghana national junior team, which is positive for his SI (UNRISD, 1994). The colts team and the social groups in the communities played a significant role in his life— it provided a platform that benefited his SI in the streets.

Migratory Trajectory and the Value of Football

When asked whether he was happy when the opportunity came, Nii Odartey Lamptey replied, I was happy when the opportunity came, I did not ignore it.⁷

Nii Odartey Lamptey spent some night under faculty cars and garage workshops in the streets. This supported his SI into a Moslem community that offered him solidarity and comfort. Unfortunately, the biological mother did not know that the son had been through a lot of hardships since she lost touch with him. Nii Odartey Lamptey had not given up on his dream of playing professionally abroad. His association with his social group comforted him and nursed his ambitions and his dreams.

At age 15, Nii Odartey Lamptey was an integral member of the Ghana national U16 team that represented his country in the Scotland competition. This particular tournament proved relevant for his professional football career as he attracted the attention of football scouts, club officials, and agents. In the first match, he was selected as the man of the match, which made Pelé of Brazil hail him as his successor, judging from his potentials exhibited in the competition. Nii Odartey Lamptey restated what Pelé said, “Nii Odartey Lamptey is going to become a star player like me in the future.”⁸ Unfortunately, Pelé’s prediction did not happen for Nii Odartey Lamptey, largely because of his poor background and lack of formal basic education. These pitfalls made Nii Odartey Lamptey a target of constant exploitation by various football agents, who benefited from his potential abroad for over 5 years. He recalled,

So, my agent came to the house and he was asking for the money and I told him they said the money is for me, he said, no! Some people were part of the transactions and he has to give them money. This agent was “mad” and he threw the documents away and drove off . . . still, I didn’t mind him. It means behind me he has been doing these without my consent and as I said, I was illiterate—I didn’t know what I was signing. Since then my eyes were opened and before that time, I had already played for about 5 to 6 years gone. Because of that, I did not want my kids to go through the situation I went through.⁹

The Scotland tournament in 1989 was the tipping point for Nii Odartey Lamptey. When the tournament ended, RSC Anderlecht of Belgium trailed him and secured his playing rights through a player arrangement approach. RSC Anderlecht used their former player, the late Stephen Keshi (Nigerian International) as a link to Nii Odartey Lamptey because Nigeria was the closest Anglophone country to Ghana. Keshi then communicated with his local manager in Nigeria to contact Nii Odartey Lamptey in Ghana. This brought good news to Nii Odartey Lamptey, who became excited when the local manager of Keshi visited him in Ghana and briefed him about the Anderlecht club’s interest in his talent.

Shortly afterward, the junior national team broke camp and Nii Odartey Lamptey decided to go and look for the local manager in Nigeria. His intention was to see whether something positive may come out of his trip to Nigeria. During that time, it was not a norm for an adolescent to travel alone across national borders. With money in hand, the 15-year-old boy asked for the directions and documentation needed to enable a person cross borders to Nigeria by road. After several inquiries, he set off from Kumasi with no proper documentation. He finally arrived at the transport terminal of Nigeria in Kumasi. Nii Odartey Lamptey narrated what a risk it was to travel without proper travel documents, moving from one border to another within Africa:

I only remember people taking me to the transport station, but I can’t remember exactly where they took me to. I remember the driver asking me if I had a passport and I said, no. The driver asked if I could double the fare, he can take me to Lagos. I accepted and gave the driver the money . . . he puts me in his “504” Peugeot vehicle and we set off along with other passengers.¹⁰

His adventurous journey was full of bitter experiences. On the way to Nigeria, they had to stop the car at several checkpoints and the driver had to answer questions, and sometimes Nii Lamptey had to hide in the car boot because of his lack of proper documentation. He could hide in the car boot due to his diminutive stature at the time. All these events unfolded because of the value of football and the thrill that it brought, which drove his actions even at the peril of his life. At some of the borders, he had to get down from the car and walk long distances just to cross and reboard the car ahead. According to him, he prayed that no youth should go through this kind of unwarranted experience in life. He recapped, “I don’t want anybody to go through this experience, it was a bad experience.”¹¹

Eventually, Nii Odartey Lamptey arrived safely in Nigeria, from where he later moved to Belgium through mysterious processes with the support of Keshi and his local manager. From the outset, Nii Lamptey never informed his social group of his migration plan, an action that could be interpreted as a negative dimension of SI. While indicating a lack of trust between Nii Odartey Lamptey and his social group, perhaps there was a positive angle, the angle of independent actions that is not hampered by nosiness and interference. Whether positive or negative, Nii Odartey Lamptey’s action supports the UNRISD’s (1994) argument of finding a single definition for SI because we cannot tell whether it was for a good or bad purpose to hide the migration news from his social group. The migration journey of Nii Odartey Lamptey from Ghana across different borders of Africa portrays international migration within the same continent. The next section illustrates the migration route of Nii Odartey Lamptey from Nigeria to Belgium and his integration into his new club abroad as a minor player.

Life at the Club in Europe

The migration process of Nii Odartey Lamptey was full of uncertainties and terror, but he never relented on achieving his football dream abroad. On arrival at the Belgium Immigration, RSC Anderlecht officials were patiently waiting at the airport with the necessary documents to facilitate his entry as a minor. This made the immigration processes quite smooth for “Keshi Jnr”¹² because of the club’s management intervention at the airport. Nobody was aware of Nii Odartey Lamptey’s migratory moves, but because of his soft spot for his mother, he impressed upon the club’s management to help him get through to his mother back in Ghana. Nii Odartey Lamptey, later on, found his mother’s contact and made the club officials ring her to inform her of his arrival in Belgium after some days. The approach adopted by the RSC Anderlecht club for securing the right of the minor player cannot be compromised in the modern football recruitment of talents and prospects. Although the officials from the RSC Anderlecht club made a telephone call for him to communicate with the mother, they should have done an appropriate background check of the player to support his easy integration. Their lax attitude to such background checks gives insight into the haphazard integration process that Nii Odartey Lamptey had to deal with in his first few weeks in Europe. The lack of due process was a prelude to the problems he would have settling into his new environment. As Nii Odartey Lamptey himself affirms, he was not given any orientation upon his arrival.

At his first training session, there were doubts about him as the Nii Odartey Lamptey they saw on television playing for Ghana in the FIFA U16 tournament in Scotland was different in terms of stature than the Nii Odartey Lamptey who stood before them. Notwithstanding that, his initial touches of the ball soon erased the doubts and he was sent to join the junior team until he turned 16 years. RSC Anderlecht club offered him a 5-year contract and Keshi represented him as a parent to facilitate his contract as a minor player. Providing a minor with a contract at that time was inappropriate because he could neither read nor write and understand the content. RSC Anderlecht club’s and Keshi’s action was unfortunate and could represent that endorsement of child-trafficking through football (Esson, 2013) because of inconsistency in the regulations for minors at that time (the late 1980s). Concurrently, the FIFA regulations on minor players back then were not protective enough as compared with the current statutes on minors in football. Nii Odartey Lamptey could not live with Keshi because he only acted on behavior of his club directives that represents a perpetuation of child-trafficking which has, then, not received much global attention. Eventually, Nii Odartey Lamptey was accommodated at the Anderlecht clubhouse until his debut for the senior team in 1990 in the Belgian league.

Nii Odartey Lamptey’s initial complaints about orientation and integration may sound ludicrous but it is a worrying situation for many African migrant players. Orientation, according to these players, is a procedure that is often neglected by most foreign clubs. Nii Odartey Lamptey recalls wanting to come back to Ghana after spending a few days in the clubhouse without a companion as compared with his social group in the Moslem community:

It got to a time I wanted to come back to Ghana because of the weather, culture and food. As a minor, I used to go to training alone while I saw my colleagues coming with their parents who dropped and picked them up after training sessions. I had to walk alone to the clubhouse. It was a mess for me.¹³

In Ghana, he had his social groups around to play with, but being the only junior player among his senior players in the clubhouse made life difficult for him in the early stages of his career abroad. This is because he was not used to such an environment where life was so different from his country of origin. The club, realizing some of these difficulties, bought him a bicycle to ride to training; however, it could not solve his integration problem until a supporter accepted to accommodate him with his two children over a year until he turned 18 years. This offered him relief because he could at least have some people around to play and have fun with in his new relocation apartment. After age 18, he was given his apartment and he began to manage his own life and affairs.

Professional Football Experiences and Reflections

In his study, Darby argues that Nii Odartey Lamptey was destined to be the best young player in the world between 1989 and 1992 but “his failure to produce on a consistent level” cut short that rise to fame. This failure, Darby (2010) argues, was “as a consequence of the fact that he was treated like a piece of ‘meat’ by a range of representatives” (p. 32). Simply, Nii Odartey Lamptey was viciously exploited by a range of football representatives, people who took advantage of his lack of formal education and lined their pockets in the process. Nii Odartey Lamptey’s lack of formal basic education caused him a great deal, particularly in the signing of contracts with football agents. He was consecutively exploited by football agents for over 5 years, while he was in top form and shape in Europe, because he could neither read nor write. Around the same time, Nii Odartey Lamptey encountered racial abuse which was rampant among his team colleagues. He remarked, “racism was ‘high’ as some of my teammates openly discriminated against me in camp. On the field of play, some do not want to even pass the ball to me.”¹⁴

Even in the midst of adversity, Nii Odartey Lamptey’s resilience showed, as some of these challenges rather made him mentally strong. He did not allow them to affect his performance on the field of play. He explained that some of the difficult moments in his professional career changed his perception about life, in that “those challenges taught him how to help others and not let them go through what he went through from his childhood.”¹⁵ Thus, lessons from his professional football experience have taught him the value of supporting others and this may reflect in some of his noneconomic activities to society.

With regard to overcoming his weaknesses in understanding contracts, Nii Odartey Lamptey had to acquire the services of a private English teacher to teach him how to read and comprehend things in England. This initiative emerged after a quarrel that ensued between him and his football agent. He narrated the genesis of the incident, leading him to discover how football agents had exploited him for years due to his poor educational background:

My transfer to Aston Villa FC, I was told to come for my money which I was not aware of until a management member explained everything to me. So, I gave my bank account details and they transferred the money. A week later, my football agent came and asked for the same money, but I refused and told him the club said the money was for me. The agent gave all kind of excuses that some people were part of the transactions . . . I insisted never . . . I didn’t mind him.¹⁶

Nii Odartey Lamptey’s experiences in Europe, especially the exploitations he went through, informed his decision to establish an Educational Complex that can support children who will like to combine schooling and football in the community. Although Nii Odartey Lamptey was neglected by his separated parents and extended family, he could not abandon them due to cultural values and social norms of the community (Acheampong et al., 2020). Had he neglected his parents, he would have been ridiculed and labeled as “ungrateful” in his community, as the Ghanaian community has little tolerance for neglecting one’s parents and extended family (Acheampong et al., 2020; Acheampong, 2020; Van der Meij & Darby, 2017).

On his return to Ghana, Nii Odartey Lamptey’s experience with street life, combined with his professional football experience abroad, served as a piece of valuable information that enabled him to invest in economic and noneconomic projects in the communities. Some of the socioeconomic investments Nii Odartey Lamptey has made to society demonstrate his commitment to improving lives. These include farming, transport and garage business, real estate, among others, which can provide a source of employment for the community members. A few of his socioeconomic investments are located in three regions of Ghana and continue to support local and regional development. From his investment experiences, Nii Odartey Lamptey advises that current professional footballers should invest whatever money they earn from football and try and desist from extravagant lifestyles, which may have disastrous consequences for their postplaying careers.

Throughout his career, Nii Odartey Lamptey opted to keep his national identity as a Ghanaian (Tajfel, 1978) and refused to accept any other nationality proposed to him. He thinks that no matter how a country may support your dream, your place of origin is more important than anything else. In his chronicle of events, Nii Odartey Lamptey admitted that “education is the best gift you can give your child. You can give your child money, houses, properties, etc., but if you give him formal education, nobody can take that away from him.”¹⁷

Through his SI, he has learned how to appreciate people who have contributed to his success in life. This is observed through his attitude of giving back to the community members who supported his integration when he became a street child (Acheampong, 2020). His behavior reflects his attitude of looking back to one’s beginnings—giving back model proposed by Acheampong (2019). After he had finished his professional football career abroad, he came and played a season in the domestic Premier League for Asante Kotoko SC. Nii Odartey Lamptey demonstrated his social reciprocity and gratitude for his social groups’ contributions toward his success. Coincidentally, it was the first time Nii Odartey Lamptey featured in the Ghana Premier League because he never played in any division league aside from his colts team in the community. In sum, the analysis of his experiences reflects the learned values of honesty, trust, tolerance, respect, hard work, determination, discipline, appreciation, care for one’s community, and the act of giving back to society (Acheampong, 2019). These attributes show how Nii Odartey Lamptey’s life accounts have shaped and reshaped his socioeconomic investments and choices in the communities that raised him.

Conclusion

In this study, a story is told about how an abandoned boy (Nii Odartey Lamptey) was able to survive street life using his football talent to get integrated into a Moslem community. Based on his football talent and potentials, he got accepted through SI, a complex concept explained by the UNRISD (1994), after he was abandoned on the streets and had to endure the hardship at a tender age to pursue a professional football career abroad without parental and extended family support. Nii Odartey Lamptey demonstrated both negative and positive perspectives to drive his football migration process after enduring various social obstacles that nearly thwarted his efforts and desires to achieve his professional dream abroad.

Roaming through the social system, he stuck to the positives that supported his football dreams abroad; however, it should not be the model any young person takes as it is not the best approach to achieving upward social mobility in the community. The theoretical framework makes it difficult to conclude on a common definition for SI concept as the abandoned boy’s life narratives provided different viewpoints on migration, education, reintegration, professional football, and investments from his career. The fact that his SI became key to his social constraints on the streets (Lutz, 2017) does not guarantee that young players who abandon their formal education to focus their full-time attention on only football (Esson, 2013a, 2015) will willy-nilly become financially successful.

The social obstacles Nii Odartey Lamptey encountered on the streets and abroad, though unpleasant, never saddened his dream but rather provided good lessons that youths in Africa communities can learn from. Some of these experiences taught him how to invest in viable socioeconomic projects that can safeguard one’s future in the communities. On education, Nii Odartey Lamptey is advocating strongly for all and sundry to see it as the best gift and personal asset, which can be bestowed on children rather than pampering them with wealth and properties.

Parental neglect confirms some of the weaknesses that cultural and educational policy may have to readdress in the Ghanaian communities as it can deny some children their fundamental right to education.¹⁸ In effect, parental neglect and illiteracy can make some young people vulnerable to social groups that may breed social vices in the communities. Contemporarily, the community should reexamine some of their cultural values and social norms that deliberately empower people, especially elders, to abuse the rights of children and others in society. With globalization and new technologies, care should be taken to remedy some of these cultural issues, which have the potential of limiting children’s creativity and their logical reasoning as they develop. The survival strategy of the abandoned child may expose some ineffectiveness in the activities of those social intervention groups in the communities.

Regarding African youths’ strong passion for football, the study recommends that the prudent option is for boys and girls with sporting talents and prospects to combine schooling with sports to benefit from both in the future. The study may agree with the UNRISD notion on SI, yet the survival strategy of the street boy makes it difficult to settle on a specific definition of the term. Based on this study’s conclusion, the UNRISD model presents some difficulties in its interpretation because some young persons could strategically use to achieve their goals to survive in their communities. For the model to be robust, there is the need for them to review it by engaging stakeholders in education, governments, community leaders, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), victims (both successful and unsuccessful) to share their experiences for appropriate reassessment and modification to the concept. Through this approach, they can consider punitive measures for parents, extended families, and the community that may contribute to young people becoming victims of this situation. This interaction with various stakeholders may contribute to minimizing it in society.

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

ORCID iD

Ernest Yeboah Acheampong

Notes

Author Biography

Ernest Yeboah Acheampong, PhD, is a lecturer in the Department of Health, Physical Education, Recreation and Sports (HPERS) at the University of Education, Winneba. His recent book publication (with Malek Bouhaouala and Michel Raspaud) is entitled African Footballers in Europe: Migration, Community and Give Back Behaviours, London: Routledge (2020).

References

Acheampong

E.Y.

(2019). Giving back to society: Evidence from African sport migrants. Sport in Society - Cultures, Commerce, Media, Politics, 22(12), 2045–2064. http://doi.org/10.1080/17430437.2018.1551367

Acheampong

E.Y.

(2020). How does professional football status challenge African players’ behaviour? Soccer & Society, 21(2),137–151. http://doi.org/10.1080/14660970.2018.1541797

Acheampong

E. Y.

Bouhaouala

Raspaud

(2020). Critical research in football: African footballers in Europe: Migration, community, and give back behaviours. Routledge, Taylor & Francis.

Agergaard

Engh

H. M.

(2013). Producing mobility through locality and visibility: Developing a transnational perspective on sports labour migration. International Review for the Sociology of Sport, 50(8), 974–992. https://doi.org/10.1177/1012690213509994

Blau

P. M.

(1960). A theory of social integration. American Journal of Sociology, 65(6), 545–556.

Darby

(2010). “Go outside”: The history, economics and geography of Ghanaian football labour migration. African Historical Review, 42(1), 19–41. https://doi.org/10.1080/17532523.2010

Esson

(2013a). A body and a dream at a vital conjuncture: Ghanaian youth, uncertainty and the allure of football. Geoforum, 47, 84–92. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2013.03.011

Esson

(2013b). A body and a dream: West African youth, mobility and football trafficking [PhD thesis, University College London].

Esson

(2015). Escape to victory: Development, youth entrepreneurship and the migration of Ghanaian footballers. Geoforum, 64, 47–55. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2015.06.005

10.

Esson

(2016). Football as a vehicle for development: Lessons from male Ghanaian youth. In Ansell

Klocker

Skelton

(Eds.), Geographies of global issues: Change and threat (Vol. 8, pp. 1–18). Springer.

11.

Hartmann

Kwauk

(2011). Sport and development: An overview, critique, and reconstruction. Journal of Sport and Social Issues, 35(3), 284–300. https://doi.org/10.1177/0193723511416986

12.

Kӧnig

R. S.

de Regt

(2010). Family dynamics in transnational African migration to Europe: An introduction. African and Black Diaspora: An International Journal, 3(1), 1–15. https://doi.org/10.1080/17528630903368232

13.

Kvale

Brinkmann

(2015). Interviews: Learning the craft of qualitative research interviewing (3rd ed.). SAGE.

14.

Langevang

(2008). “We are managing!” Uncertain paths to respectable adulthoods in Accra, Ghana. Geoforum, 39, 2039–2047. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2008.09.003

15.

Loring

(1988). Unemployment and social integration: A review. The Journal of Sociology & Social Welfare, 15(4), 162–176. https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/jssw/vol15/iss4/10

16.

Lutz

(2017). Two logics of policy intervention in immigrant integration: An institutionalist framework based on capabilities and aspirations. Comparative Migration Studies, 5, 19.

17.

North

D. C.

(1991). Institutions. The Journal of Economic Perspectives, 5(1), 97–112.

18.

Rolleston

Okech

(2008). Educational expansion in Ghana: Economic assumptions and expectations. International Journal of Educational Development, 28(3), 320–339.

19.

Tajfel

(1978). Interindividual and intergroup behaviour. In Tajfel

(Ed.), Differentiation between groups: Studies in the social psychology of intergroup relations (pp. 27–60). Academic Press.

20.

Tsoukas

(2009). Craving for generality and Small-N studies: A Wittgensteinian approach towards the epistemology of the particular in organization and management studies. In Buchanan

D. A.

Bryman

(Eds.), The SAGE handbook of organizational research methods (pp. 285–301). SAGE.

21.

United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). (n.d.). Education transforms lives. http://en.unesco.org/themes/education-21st-century

22.

United Nations Research Institute for Social Development. (1994). Social integration: Approaches and issues (Briefing Paper No. 1). World Summit for Social Development.

23.

Van der Meij

Darby

. (2014). No one will burden the sea and then never get any benefit: Family involvement in players’ migration to football academies in Ghana. In Harris

Elliot

(Eds.), Football and migration (pp. 159–179). Routledge.

24.

Van der Meij

Darby

. (2017). Getting in the game and getting on the move: Family, the intergenerational contract and internal migration into football academies in Ghana. Sport in Society, 20(11), 1580–1595. https://doi.org/10.1080/17430437.2017.1284807