EFFECT OF CALENDAR ADHERENCE ON FOOTBALL CLUB PERFORMANCE AT NATION AND CONTINENTAL COMPETITIONS

Abstract

Nigeria Premier Football League (NPFL) followership is fast declining which is worrisome to football enthusiasts. It is on record that NPFL organizers have unethically failed to comply with the proposed football timetable/calendar for decades, which has been said to distort the progress and administration of football in Nigeria. It is of note that NPFL clubs have failed to win continental competitions for several years running. Based on this premise, this study assessed the importance of calendar adherence by Nigerian football clubs for the improvement of performance at national and continental competitions. The study adopted a descriptive survey research design with Four hundred and twenty (n=420) samples, selected from football stakeholders in the Nigeria Premier Football League, using a multi-stage sampling procedure.  Out of the (n=420) sample selected, (n=354) questionnaires were returned valid. Two research hypotheses were tested in this study. A self-structured instrument was used for data collection which was in two parts of A and B. The A part collected demographic information of the participants, while the B part was the questionnaire used to collect data for testing the hypotheses titled Calendar Adherence Questionnaire (CAQ, r=0.83). Data collected was analyzed using descriptive statistics, involving simple frequency count (f), percentages (%), means (x̅), and standard deviation (SD) scores which were used to describe the demographic characteristics of the respondents while Multiple Regression Analysis (MRA) were used to test the hypotheses at the 0.05 significance. The result shows a non-significant outcome (F = 1.369, p > 0.05), (F = .020, p > 0.05).  The result implies that adherence to football season calendar does significance contribute to the club performance at both national and continental competitions respectively. The results of this study revealed that there is relationship between calendar adherence and football club performance at national and continental competitions despite the low-level significance. The study recommended that there is an urgent need for the Interim Management Committee to develop a calendar/timetable for NPFL that will be at variance with CAF/FIFA standards to improve NPFL club’s performance at national and continental competitions.