THE STAKE

It was the day of the AFCON semifinals. Nigeria was to play against South Africa to be qualified for the finals. I had my friends, Jerry and Clinton come over to my place so we could watch the match together.

Source

The game was going to take place in the evening. At around 7pm. Jerry arrived my place first as the distance from his to mine wasn't so much. The electricity supply in the state is quite epileptic, but since I own a generator set, the plan was to see the gane at mine..

When Jerry arrived, the first thing he did was to check the fuel tank, to see if there was enough fuel to last the tine. We could not afford to get cut off supply.

"My guy, where is the closest gas station around here?," he asked with all seriousness.

"What's the problem?" I asked cause I had already bought fuel for last night which I assumed would be enough.

"I want to get enough fuel for the generator," he answered.

"But there is fuel in the generator"

"No, it won't be enough, and I don't want anything that will make me miss a single minute from the match," he replied.

"There's a gas station just across from that plaza. You can go there." I didn't want to argue cause I did not want to take the blame if anything happened to occur while watching the match. He left and got back later with the fuel.

Later that evening, when we had already put the generator on and was waiting for the kickoff, Clinton arrived.
He, like us, is a football fanatic but unlike us, he had no hopes nor even the slightest expectations from the Nigerian team. He said he just came to hangout and watch the match with us since he was going to be bored if he stayed alone in his home to watch the game.

Before the game began, Clinton excused himself to go get us snacks. He had with him some suya and drinks on his return. He placed the items on the center table while we moved closer to enjoy the goodies.

"I can bet you, that we would not even score a goal, talk less of winning," Clinton said with all the boldness one could summon. Jerry just ignored him cause he had his entire head in the game.

"How much would you like to place on the bet?," I asked between mouthfuls as I cast a quick glance at him. He smiled like he had seen the future and was sure about him winning the bet.

"You want a bet? Okay, I'm staking 5000 naira. If Nigeria wins, you get my money but if they don't, I get yours. Which I will. Deal?".

Clinton always had this courage and strong stand on whatever he said. Jerry who didn't care less about us agreed to be our middle man. So we both sent each a sum of 5000 naira. Then we focused on seeing the game.

My room is quite small and there was so much heat, so we put on the fan. Fatigued from a long day, I soon fell asleep. It's funny how I dreamt of losing the bet while I slept. The shouts of "goaalll!" jolted me awake.

Jerry's cries of excitement sent me out of Dreamland. Nigeria had scored a goal. I joined him to cheer. Clinton was not phased at all which made me start having thoughts of regret. The confidence he showed was amazing. And bafana-bafana, the south African club still had some minutes to equalize and even possibly, win.
Not long after the super eagles scored another goal. I could see the confidence sift away from Clinton's face.
"No!!!, why now?" Jerry shouted again.The referee had canceled the second goal. He cancelled it because of a foul. I could see a slight grin play on Clinton's face. Our opponents were then given a penalty kick, I could feel my heart beating against my chest."Goal!!!" Clinton was the loudest this time. He then looked from the TV to me and said "I told you! Just get ready to lose 5k." The sleep left my eyes instantly. I was wide awake now. Now, my regret was weighing more on me. I had little money in my account and betting the amount I did, was irrational.

By now, the tension in the room was building up. My heartbeat had doubled We jumped, jerked, cursed and shouted due to the performances. I could barely sit still.

Finally, the 120minutes plus extra time was up with both teams having a goal each, and the match was going to be decided on penalties. This part was always a tough one. Bafana-bafana scored two of their penalties and the Super eagles scored four penalty goals. We shouted so loud, i thought we would pull down the roof with all that noise. I not only proved Clinton wrong but I also won a sum of 5000 naira, and it gave me the absolute sweet feeling. The Super Eagl boys made me some bucks richer. A super sweet victory it was!

Thanks for stopping by.
SOKA 🖤