SPECIALFEATURE
58 WORLD SOCCEROsimhen had apparently told him it
would “bust heads.” By the time the
game was over, Emmanuel Dennis
had become a household name.
“It was a crazy night for me,” he
recalls. “Oh, my days! My phone? Oh
my God! My phone that night, I swear,
I had almost 50,000 messages. I was
getting goose bumps. That night was
one of the best nights [of my life].”
In that moment, it seemed like he
could do no wrong. Then came interest
from several clubs, most notably in the
Premier League where the likes of
Arsenal and Manchester United
were linked with Dennis.
However, Club Brugge were not
minded to allow their new superstar to
leave without extracting maximum value,
and interested buyers baulked at the
quoted fee. It was against this backdrop
of disillusionment at the stalling of his
career prospects that the forward, upon
finding his seat on the team bus taken,
refused to board ahead of a Champions
League match with Borussia Dortmund.
A loan transfer to German side
Cologne was supposed to provide
something of a fresh start, but it was
a bad move for all parties. Erstwhile
Billy Goats sporting director Horst
Heldt called it a “bad transfer”, Dennis
struggled with mental health issues
and Brugge lost value on a prized
asset and were ultimately forced
to sell in a cut-price deal.
Aware of the reputation the end
of his time in Belgium has earned him,
Dennis has been deliberate about
keeping an even lower profile and
avoiding confrontation since joining
Watford, instead letting his football
do the talking.
“People say: ‘Ah yeah, we know him.
He’s a stubborn guy. He’s arrogant. He
had problems in Club Brugge, he had
problems in Germany.’Yeah.
I had problems in Brugge, in
Germany – you don’t want
me to have problems in
England as well. That’s
why I’m respecting
everything, [so as] not
to have more problems,”
he admitted.
It is a decision that has already
come at a high cost: while he has
stayed out of trouble in England,
his unavailability for the Africa
Cup of Nations inJanuary set
tongues wagging and called his
commitment to the national
team into question.
After a tense back-and-
forth with Watford over
releasing the player,Prolific season...
Dennis celebrates
one of his Premier
League goalsthe Nigeria Football Federation (NFF)
accused the club of “baring fangs” and
elected to leave him out of the squad.
Dennis, however, tells it very
diffferently.“Letmejustmakeitclear
for everyone. I’ve always come to the
national team whenever they invite me.
I mean, it’s Nigeria, it’s the national
team,it’stheSuperEagles–that’severy child’s dream, to play for the
Super Eagles. No one’s going to say no
to representing his country. Impossible.
“They [the NFF] sent a letter. The
letter didn’t arrive at the normal
time, so the club said: ‘Look,
we’re not going to let you go
because they didn’t respect
the rules, the letter didn’t58 WORLD SOCCER