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Every weekend, bants flow, football fans go against each other, and big fixtures attract crowds to viewing centers. Nope, they are not Shooting Stars fans, and neither are the Enyimba followers.
It’s not a strange thing to hear supporters chant their slogans as greetings, “up Barça” or “Man U for Life”, even “Blues for life”. They show their colours, wave flags, and dorn their respective jerseys.
Arguments go on endlessly about which team is the better, which will win the next game, or which has the best players.
However, what is not sorted is identifying which foreign club has the most fans in Nigeria. Let’s find out what colour is more popular amongst Nigerian football fans.
Top 5 Football Clubs With The Most Fans In Nigeria
1. Chelsea
I don’t think anyone will doubt their placement on this list, the Blues has the largest fan base in Nigeria. This is usually felt on the streets when the Stamford Bridge side plays.
Ask viewing center owners and let them resonate with how huge their sales are whenever Chelsea plays.
The reason for the large populace of Chelsea supporters is due to several Nigerian players who played for the team.
Celestine Babayaro, Mikel Obi, Victor Moses, and Kenneth Omeruo are the most prominent whom Nigerians could connect with.
However, the boom started in 2005/2006 when John Mikel Obi joined Jose Mourinho at Chelsea after a successful FIFA U20 World Cup in the Netherlands.
It was a period that coincided with winning silverware and as they say, success has many friends thus Nigerians stuck with Chelsea.
Check out their 2008 run to the UEFA Champions League final and 2012 win in the same competition. They have managed to keep their fans over the last two decades while other fans are jumping ships to become Chelsea fans due to their consistent success winning silverware.
2. Manchester United
Unlike Chelsea whose fan base was influenced by Nigerians who played for the Blues, Manchester United has a large fanbase purely based on silverware success.
Manchester United are the record winner of the Premier League and also occasionally win the UEFA Champions League, they are considered one the biggest clubs in Europe and at some point mentioned in the same line with Real Madrid, AC Milan, Juventus, Bayern Munich, and Barcelona.
The antecedents of Sir Alex Ferguson were exciting to see and a top-four clash between Manchester United and the likes of Chelsea, Arsenal, and Liverpool always brought football fans out of their homes.
3. Arsenal
Arsenal falls within the category of football clubs whose Nigerian families’ fanbase was influenced by the Nigerian and African players who played for the club in this situation it was Kanu Nwankwo.
The lanky striker was a fan favorite at the club and is still respected as a part of the invincible team that went unbeaten in the Premier League in 2003/04.
Furthermore, the club was also one of the consistent rivals of Manchester United and they both vied for the Premier League trophy for over a decade.
Meanwhile, a new generation of Arsenal fans were born in 2006 when they lost to Barcelona in the UEFA Champions League final. A lot of undecided football fans opted to follow the winner of the final between the North Londoners and the Spaniards.
Well, Barcelona won and a large chunk of the new generation of fans drifted to the Catalonia side and the rest stuck with the Gunners who lost more fans during their over ten-year trophy drought.
4. Barcelona
Barcelona grew in terms of followership in Nigeria with the rise of Lionel Messi. The Argentine’s magic captivated many around the world and the fever got to Africa.
To be candid, he wasn’t the only reason for the followership, Thierry Henry moved to Barcelona after that UEFA Champions League final between the Blaugrana and Arsenal, and with him went some Arsenal fans.
Barcelona enjoyed a long decade of domestic and continental success, and they became more popular just as the El Clasico fixture with Real Madrid.
Even in the absence of the Argentine forward, Barcelona fans still abound in the country but are not as visible as they used to be
5. Liverpool
Liverpool’s followership in Nigeria is quite an interesting one, there isn’t any full-fledged Nigerian who did play for the team for a long time and they also didn’t win a Premier League title until 2020.
However, they were always at the top with the UEFA Champions League. Even in their lowest, the Reds never walked alone, at least not in Nigeria.
In conclusion, football fans in Nigeria are majorly spread across Premier League clubs and this is due to the popularity and visibility of the league in the country. Fans are now spread across other teams who have stepped up including Manchester City. Old traditional big teams like AC Milan, Inter Milan, and Real Madrid still enjoy their popularity as well.
