Is Eto’o becoming bad for the Cameroonian team?

After countless troubles and tribulations, two goals conceded, one extra time, a shaken Cameroon managed to squeeze its way to the semi-finals. And the best of all? That the team's biggest star was a complete flop.

In the aftermath of Cameroon's sensational wave of success in the 1990 World Cup, the waters became muddy. Many of the players complained that their input was not valued highly enough.

'We played, Milla won', remarked Francois Oman-Biyik, who headed in the winning goal against Argentina.

An indignant Milla retorted: 'Oman-Biyik does not understand anything. I didn't play for myself but for the youth of Cameroon. If I had played for myself, I would have sat in a car and driven along Champs-Élysée and shouted: "I am the greatest"'.

He went on a pr-tour

Milla did not go so far but the waist twisting cult declared man went on a worldwide pr-tour to sell himself. He signed for Cape Town Hellenic in South Africa but demanded 65 times the pay of his team mates. He was invited to play the return match against England in Wembley but refused to take part because he was not paid an appearance fee.

He was honoured with a yearly award by a Nigerian chief but refused to give up the rotating trophy when the following year's winner was to be crowned. It was easy to see how it was in Milla's life in several ways. Was it a simple display of greed – or the just rewards for a folk hero who singlehandedly raised his continent up? A young Eto'o thought the later was the case.

'Roger Milla is my only idol, the greatest player of all time. He was the one who gave hope to Cameroon, to all of Africa', says Eto'o.

Last week, I read an article by Vincent Fouda, a Cameroonian researcher in the Sociology Department at Laval University in Quebec. It was titled: 'Eto'o, Cameroon football star and Cameroon football's grave digger'.

Samuel Eto'o has become Roger Milla's heir apparent in more ways than one. The article dealt with how Eto'o has started to believe a little too much in the myth surrounding him, how he has come occupy too much space in and around the yellow-green team.

He has become the manager

Do not get me wrong. Samuel Eto'o is a fantastic ambassador for Africa and one of the world's absolute best players. But of late, he has also assumed the roles of playmaker, coach, organiser and godfather to the Cameroonian team. This is a situation that does no one any good. The Indomitable Lions have become a worse team with the blooming of Eto'o into a superstar.

Before yesterday's quarterfinal match, Cameroon had scored 18 goals in the last two tournaments. Samuel Eto'o alone scored 10 of these – 56 per cent, an unhealthy amount. A one-man team is never a good football team.

Yesterday, Cameroon showed that it is more than that. In more than 120 minutes against Tunisia, Eto'o was, at best, anonymous and, at worst, a direct failure. Instead, it was the 21 year old Stéphane Mbia who became the hero of the match and 20 year old Alexandre Song was the team's best player. A change in generations has contributed to some tough years for Cameroon, but a new crop of players is now taking over.
 
Everything takes its time. First, the new team must learn to do without Samuel Eto'o and then they must search for a way of utilising his unique qualities. If they succeed in doing both, the lions will once again become indomitable.

Erik Niva
Aftonbladet (February 5th, 2008)
Translation: Kofi Sapathy