Football: John Mikel Obi didn’t get the African unite message of Nicolas Jackson
By Dailytab24
Background
John Mikel Obi will forever remain a Chelsea legend after spending successful years with the London team, dubbed the pride of London, Chelsea Football Club lived the hype as soon as Jose Mourinho took over the managerial position of the club under the then new Russian billionaire buyer.
The records the club kept under Mounrinho at Stamford Bridge are yet to be broken, undefeated for a couple of years.
Mikel Obi was signed after his exploits in the under 20 Fifa World Cup, where he shined as an attacking midfielder.
His controversial transfer to Stamford Bridge instead of Old Trafford gave him the opportunity to play under Mourinho where he was changed from an attacking midfielder to a defensive one, underlining an end to the Mikel we saw in the under 20 Fifa World Cup.
Mourinho was blamed for killing the natural attacking talent of Mikel Obi, but irrespective of the critics, Mikel patiently stayed behind and played for the club of his dream for years.
He endured different managerial changes during his time at Chelsea, which largely affected his career and put him under continuous learning and adaptation.
Not known for goals in his time at Chelsea, Mikel can well define the roles on a football field.
He was tutored or coached to understand that on the pitch, not everyone is expected to score, rather, everyone is expected to maintain his duty at a given time to give the right balance to a team.
Mourinho only wanted Mikel Obi to pivotally hold his defence while those tasked with scoring do the job.
This nature of coaching took over Mikel’s style of play, and he is now accustomed to the belief that goal scoring is specially made for strikers.
Throughout his time at Chelsea, Mikel mustered just a few goals, but never had he been blamed for not scoring because his job was mainly to protect the team against the opposite strikers. And each time he scored a goal, the club celebrated it like there would never be another goal throughout his career.
Mikel’s Critique
It’s not a surprise that after retiring from the game, Mikel is critical of strikers who have not been able to score goals for his club, where he cemented a legendary status.
The former Super Eagles player is now anchoring a TV podcast where he hosts former players and has been outspoken against those he sees as underperformers in his former club.
Nicolas Jackson was picked for criticism by Mikel Obi in his recent podcast. The former Chelsea defensive midfielder tackled the striker for not converting and shooting enough, outlining that Chelsea needs strikers that have the capacity to shoot.
Throughout last season, Nicolas Jackson, who was signed from Villarreal, was shy in front of the goal and missed significant chances, which made him prey for critics.
While he scored double-digit goals in his first season, it was not enough to convince his critics who believe he is rusty in front of goal and barely shoot.
Mikel Obi is of the opinion that Chelsea needs a striker like Victor Osimhen, who is having issues with his club and desperately wants a move.
While from every indication, Mikel is not trying to force Nicolas Jackson out, but trying to help him improve through criticisms, Nicolas Jackson sees it from a different perspective.
The opinion of the former Chelsea player seems to have irked the Ivory Coast player, who didn’t take it rightly with the former Nigerian player.
Jackson’s Reaction
Reacting on his Instagram page, Nicolas Jackson who broke a record for Chelsea in the second game of the Premier League season with the club’s fastest goal decided to seize the opportunity and take a swipe against his critic.
The Chelsea striker blatantly told Mikel Obi to ‘shut his mouth’ while informing him that he was suffering for Africa.
The message Nicolas Jackson passed was not captured by Mikel Obi, who in turn replied to the Ivory Coast striker, letting him know that once he started scoring goals, he would stop criticizing him.
Mikel Obi went further to explain that his purpose of criticizing the striker was for him to improve and doesn’t hate him.
Mikel took the message at face value without clearly seeing that Jackson was speaking about Africans supporting Africans abroad.
The Chelsea player must have seen Mikel Obi’s criticism as betrayal from an African brother and perhaps tried to tell Mikel that Africans should be their brothers’ keeper and not the other way round
Conclusion
Generally, African players and other foreign players face undue criticism in England, and sometimes, don’t get the due praise for their exploits.
Mohammed Salah is a perfect example of what African players face in England; they easily get roasted for underperforming and get less praise for high performance.
Jackson simply wants Mikel to be supportive of African players even in their odd time. Like most England pundits praise English players and hype them to the sky, Jackson wants the few African pundits or podcasts that have a voice to play the same role as the English pundits, but Mikel failed to grasp the message.
Nicolas Jackson is still settling down in the Premier League and has been praised by his country man, Didier Drogba, who is also a Chelsea legend. Drogba urged him to continue to work hard and believe that everything would click for him.
