Super Eagles and Galatasaray striker Victor Osimhen has opened up on how the death of his father during the COVID-19 pandemic nearly convinced him to walk away from football for good, Footynaija reports.
Osimhen was at Lille when the pandemic hit in early 2020, having just enjoyed a breakthrough season in France that would eventually earn him a move to Napoli.
His father, Patrick, was 80 and his health was deteriorating back home in Lagos. With airports shut and football suspended across Europe, the striker tried desperately to arrange a private flight back to Nigeria.
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He had even secured clearance from the aviation authority to land. All he needed was the green light from his club and his agent. But that never came.
“But that’s when I started to understand the dark side of football. The business. They wanted to sell me, you see? They were discussing a transfer. So my former agent kept telling me, ‘Well, it’s complicated. Just wait. Just wait,’” Osimhen shared in a report by the Players’ Tribune.
The 2 had left his phone downstairs to shower one morning when the calls from family back in Nigeria started coming in. When he rang his brother back on FaceTime, the camera turned to show him his father lying there.
Patrick Osimhen died on May 23, 2020, at the age of 80, after a brief illness in Lagos.
Per the report, Osimhen tore through his house and smashed everything in sight. His neighbours, who had become like family to him during the lonely months in France, came over and spent hours trying to bring him back from the edge.
The guilt hit him just as hard as the loss. Every one of his siblings had been at their father’s side. He was the only one who was not.
When his former agent told him to return to training by Friday, Osimhen’s response was, “Friday? To hell with football.”
He flew home for the burial, though even that was complicated. Upon landing in Lagos via a chartered flight arranged by Lille, he was moved to a COVID-19 isolation centre under NCDC protocols, meaning he had to spend 14 days in quarantine before he could properly grieve with his family.
“When I flew back home, I really thought that maybe I would never play football again. I was so disgusted with everything,” he admitted.
Patrick Osimhen was a former driver who once washed dishes in a police department kitchen to keep his seven children fed after losing his job.
