Nigeria, Today, has over 400 football clubs at various categories ranging from division 1 to 3 at either national or state levels. Competitions are organised at the different levels i.e state or national. Football (soccer) has now become the most important sport in Nigeria today and also a symbol of national unity. While majority of the clubs are privately owned, a few others still have significant government participetion or even fully owned by some government corporations. Football clubs are independently run and managed without any interference from the government. However, movement of players between clubs are regulated by the soccer rulling body known aas the Nigeria Football Association (N F A). All clubs are required to be registered with the association and their normal contributions paid. All local competitions are organised by the association, and the international competitions are monitored by same N F A.
There are some few clubs that have dominated the soccer scene in the country for the past 2 or 3 decades . They have recorded considerable success in soccer both locally and internationally. The most outstanding among them are the following:
Shooting Stars Sports Club:
This is the first club in nigeria to win an international honour for the country. They achieve this when they won the African Winners Cup Competition in 1976. They have won this competition twice and has got to the final four other times.
This is the only club that have played in the final of the african Champions league Competition at five different times, even though they have never won the competition.
It is also the first club in Africa to win the CAF cup competition when it won the maden edition of the competition when it was introduced.
It has won the Nigeria premier league more than ten times, and the FA cup competition for about 12 times.
Shooting Stars is the best and the most consistent club in Nigeria.
Rangers Football Club:
The club has won the African Winners Club competition once in 1977 when they defeated the Shooting Stars at the final.Bendel Insurance Football Club:
This is another club that has won the Nigerian FA cup competition twice and has on several occasion been runners up at both the FA cup and the national league competitions.
It has won the West African Football Union competition for about six times. Bendel has also contributed greatly to soccer development in Nigeria.
There are quite a lot of other strong clubs in Nigeria that can not be listed here.
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