Bashing of New Stars & Eding exposes barren Cameroon football

New Stars FC of Douala and Eding Sport of the Lekie have been eliminated from the CAF Cup and CAF Champions League respectively.

The 2017 Cameroon Cup winners were butted out by Deportivo Mongomo following a 2-2 aggregate draw on Tuesday in Bata, while a 1-0 loss to Plateau United yesterday in Yaoundé, made it a 4-0 aggregate defeat to the MTN Elite 1 champions of Cameroon.

Eding Sport 0-1 Plateau Utd (agg: 0-4)

The dismal performances by both New Stars and Eding Sport have evoked painful memories about the dwindling state of football in the country. Since winning the African Cup Winners' Cup in 1975, the legendary Tonnerre Kalara of Roger Milla, Rigobert Song and George Weah have failed to rise back to continental ranks.

In fact, politics and hypocrisy have relegated the one-time pride of Mvog Ada to the inglorious MTN Elite 2 championship. 

Created in 1930, Canon Yaoundé hit the peak in the 70s and 80s, bagging three African Champions Cups and one African Cup Winners' Cup.

Today, power tussle and greed have reduced Le Mekok Megonda to an object of ridicule. The inability to defend their mettle has seen The Kpakums now rub shoulders with class one clubs.

Union Douala, formerly known as Jeunesse Bamiléké, are also gradually going comatose since lifting the African Champions Cup in 1979. Come to think of Oryx Club of Douala. The Littoral outfit won the inaugural African Champions Cup in 1964 after beating Stade Malien 2-1 in the final.

However, Oryx have since then been unable to defend national colours, not even in the domestic sphere. 

After the golden generation, Coton Sport of Garoua emerged, rekindling the hopes of Cameroonians. Since salvaging silver in the CAF Cup in 2003, and the CAF Champions League in 2008, winning a continental trophy has remained a traumatizing nightmare.

After UMS of Loum, Apejes of Mfou and YOSA, Eding Sport and New Stars became the latest continental adventurers from Cameroon. The actors keep changing but the outcomes are a fiasco and tasteless mediocrity. 

Yes, Cameroonian football is not only stagnating but sinking deep into the abyss. While some accusing fingers point at football administration and financial inadequacies, others question the professionalism of the domestic league.  

In 2013, FIFA and CAF jointly made efforts to reorganize FECAFOOT for the better. However, intellectual dishonesty, politics, fraud and greed hijacked electoral procedures, leading to the normalization committee that is being spoken of these days. What a story for a supposed emerging country! 

Well, we are in the land of promise, the land of glory, whose worth no tongue can tell.