Chukwuma Akabueze

Bentley
Chukwuma Akabueze (2009)
Personnel
Surname	Chukwuma Emmanuel Akabueze
birthday	May 6, 1989
place of birth	Ilorin , Kwara ,  Nigeria
size	180 cm
position	Wingers and strikers
Juniors
Years	station
	Kwara United
Men's
Years	station	Games (goals) 1
2005-2007	Kwara United
2007-2011	Odd Grenland	95 (32)
2011–2012	Brann Bergen	53 (13)
2013	Wuhan Zall	27 0(3)
2014-2017	Odds BK	89 (19)
2017–	Boluspor	73 (15)
National team
Years	selection	Games (goals)
~ 2007 ~	Nigeria U20	at least 8 0(5)
2007	Nigeria	2 0(1)
1 Only league games are given.

Chukwuma Emmanuel Akabueze (born May 6, 1989 in Ilorin , Kwara ) is a Nigerian football player on the position of a winger and striker . The offensive player, also known as Bentley , has been under contract with the Turkish second division club Boluspor since 2017 .

Club career

Career start at home

Chukwuma Akabueze was born on May 6, 1989 in Ilorin, the capital of the Nigerian state of Kwara, and began playing football as a child. The former street footballer gained his first experience in organized football at the Pepsi Football Academy in Akure . At club level, he appeared for the Kwara United club, which was founded in 1997 in its current form . There he was initially employed in the youth department and made the leap into the men's team in 2005, which at that time had already been represented in the Nigerian first class for a number of years . In his first year of play , he reached tenth place in the table with the team and was eliminated from the Nigerian Football Cup early on. A year later , he and the team made it to first place in Group A in the basic round and qualified together with the runner-up in Group A and the first and second place in Group B for the season-closing Super League , which was organized in a short group phase Final round. In this he finished third with Kwara United after two draws and a loss from three games at the end of the season. In the 2006 Nigerian Cup, the team came to an abrupt end when they lost their first game against Sharks FC . With the team that finished fourth at the end of the season, Akabueze started the following game year. Shortly after the season, he made the jump to the senior national team of his home country , took to the U-20 team at the U-20 World Cup 2007 in Canada in part and made the leap to Europe.

Change to Norway

In the summer of 2007 Akabueze signed a contract with the Norwegian first division club Odd Grenland , after he had previously presented to Lyn Oslo , but received no contract offer there. The capital club already had three players from outside the European Economic Area under contract and, according to the Norwegian Football Association, were not allowed to sign any further foreign players. He made his debut at the Grenland club on August 5, 2007 in a game against Lyn Oslo of all places. In the 2-0 home win, Bentley was substituted on by coach Arne Sandstø for the Czech Zbyněk Pospěch at half- time and did the preparatory work for Stefan Bärlin's goal to make it 2-0 in the 75th minute of the game by pass . In the two subsequent games against Aalesunds FK and Viking Stavanger , the left foot was only used as a substitute player and scored the only goal of his team.

Even after that he did not manage to assert himself as a regular player, although he always brought good offensive performances and prepared goals several times. After his team had lost six of the last eight games, the Nigerian was barely considered in the last three games of the season and only played a very few minutes. Although these last championship games were all won, Odd Grenland had to be twelfth in the relegation. In the 1-0 defeat in the first leg, as well as the 3-2 defeat in the second leg, the Nigerian offensive player came again only to short appearances and then went down with the team in the second highest football league in Norway . Akabueze came to another competitive game on September 26, 2007, when he was used in the semi-finals of the Norwegian Men's Football Cup 2007 with 0: 1 against FK Haugesund . Across all competitions, the 1.80 m tall offensive man played twelve competitive games, scored two goals and contributed three assists.

Return to the Elite Series

Chukwuma Akabueze (right) with Simen Brenne (2009)

After Arne Sandstø had to vacate his place at the end of September 2007 and the subsequent interim coach Ove Flindt-Bjerg left at the end of the year, Akabueze was first used in the Adeccoligaen 2008 under Dag-Eilev Fagermo . In the Norwegian second division, the Nigerian acted extremely dangerous offensively and already scored a hat trick in the second championship round . Especially in the first 16 championship rounds up to the beginning of August 2008, Bentley, as the young attacking player was called, was able to draw attention to himself through his offensive strength, where he contributed eight goals and as many assists during this period. By the end of the year, after the team had consistently been considered a favorite for the title and a candidate for promotion, the Nigerian international had made 28 out of 30 possible league appearances. Here he had a record of nine goals and ten assists and was behind the top scorer Péter Kovács (22 goals) and Morten Fevang (15 goals), with his nine goals he was the third most successful scorer of Odd Grenland this season. With 65 points reached, Odd Grenland rose directly to the Tippeligaen as first place in the Adeccoligaen. In the Norwegian Football Cup 2008 , he also made it to the semi-finals with his team and was defeated in this just 1: 2 to the eventual cup winner Vålerenga Oslo .

In the following Tippeligaen 2009 , the 1.80 m tall offensive player acted again as a regular player and was used in 29 of the 30 league games, scoring six goals and preparing a further seven goals for his teammates. Behind Péter Kovács (16 goals) and Simen Brenne (9 goals) he was the team's third-best goalscorer with six goals. Especially in the first two thirds of the 2009 game year, Odd Grenland was on the way to an international starting place; Akabueze and his team only lost three games after 22 rounds. From the end of August, however, the slump took place, with Odd Grenland ultimately still holding fourth place in the table, but could no longer secure an international starting place. The Norwegian Cup of the game year 2009 ended for the team, as in the previous season. In the semifinals, the team around the Nigerian, who was used as the left winger in this game, lost in a narrow 0: 1 defeat against eventual cup winners Aalesunds FK . Also in the following Tippeligaen 2010 , Bentley was used by Fagermo as a regular on the wings; mainly as a left winger, more rarely as a right winger, the Nigerian was used again in 29 of 30 games and had a record of nine goals and eight assists. With his nine goals he was the team's top scorer. At the end of the season he was fifth in the table with Odd Grenland and only just failed to qualify for an international starting position. He was just as close again in the Norwegian Football Cup, with Odd Grenland only losing to Strømsgodset Toppfotball in the semifinals in the course of the tournament .

Change to Brann Bergen

After Akabueze had already been associated with a Belgian first division team in January 2011, a move to league competitor SK Brann became apparent from February 2011 . On February 24, 2019, the move of the Nigerian, who would have had a contract for one season with Odd Grenland, to the football club from Bergen was announced. For a rumored transfer fee of 500,000 euros , he signed a four-year contract, whereby he should receive almost double the salary at the new club than at Odd Grenland. Akabueze, who had been operated on on the meniscus shortly before , then started preparing for the season for the Norwegians in La Manga , Spain . After he was not in the squad in the first championship game of the Tippeligaen 2011 , the then married father of one child made his competitive debut for Brann Bergen on April 4, 2011 in a 4-1 away win over Lillestrøm SK . His coach Rune Skarsfjord used him from the 79th minute as a substitute for Uruguayan Diego Guastavino . At the club from the second largest city in Norway, however, there was hardly any trace of Akabueze's previous offensive strength. From the fifth round of the championship, mostly as a regular on the wings, he only scored one goal and four assists in 25 championship appearances by the end of the season. With the team, which was always represented in the top half of the table and had ambitions to achieve an international starting position, he was fourth at the end of the season. After failing so often in the semifinals with Odd Grenland, Bentley made it to the Norwegian Cup final with Brann Bergen for the first time in his career in the Norwegian Football Cup 2011 . In this he was not used; his team lost just 1: 2 against Aalesunds FK.

Starting the 2012 game year as a substitute under coach Rune Skarsfjord , Bentley developed into a regular player again from the fifth round of the championship and shortly afterwards also a goal-getter. On May 13, 2012, he scored a hat-trick in a 4-3 away win over Lillestrøm SK and was also regularly successful as a goalscorer and less often as a template provider. In 28 of 30 possible league appearances, the 1.80m Nigerian, who was almost without exception on the left wing this season, scored nine goals and two assists, making him the team's second most successful goalscorer behind his compatriot Kim Ojo . By the end of the year Akabueze came under Skarsfjord and the interim coach Kenneth Mikkelsen, who followed him in the last championship game, from the bottom of the table to sixth place. In the Norwegian Cup 2012 , the left winger completed five of his team's six games and contributed one goal and three assists. As is so often the case in his career, the left-footed player ended up in the semi-finals; Brann Bergen lost it 1: 3 against IL Hødd .

After a year in China back to Norway

In February 2013, Wuhan Zall FC , newly promoted to the Chinese Super League , announced the signing of the former Nigerian international. There he was next to Garra Dembélé , Jacques Faty , Won-heui Jo , Novak Martinović , Danilo Peinado , Natanael de Sousa Santos Júnior and Miloš Stojanović one of eight foreign players in the Chinese squad. He made his competitive debut in the first round of the championship under coach Zheng Xiong , when he came on for Wang Yunlong at halftime in the 2-1 away defeat against Jiangsu Suning and in the 69th minute he set up a cross for Li Wei's goal to make it 1: 2 contributed. After that, Akabueze was used in a wide variety of offensive positions; in the fifth round he scored his first goal in the top Chinese football league in a 1-1 draw against Changchun Yatai away from home . Then he was used under the new coach Ljubiša Tumbaković for weeks primarily as a substitute or sat unused on the substitute bench and only came back to regular appearances from the beginning and over the full game from the beginning of July. By the end of the game year, in which he played under another coach ( Wang Jun ) from mid-August , who was replaced at the end of the year, the Nigerian had scored three goals and four assists from 27 missions, making him one of the offensively most dangerous player on his team this year. Wuhan Zall rose from the bottom of the table - in 30 league games they had only three wins - to the Chinese second division . In addition, Bentley made it to the Chinese Football Cup 2013 that year , which was over after the first game against second division team Guangdong Sunray Cave .

After a little successful playing year 2013, Akabueze returned to Norway in March 2014. His ex-club from Grenland, now appearing as Odds BK, had tied him for three years. At Odds Ballklubb, he was again given the number 26 on his back, with which he had already appeared on his last engagement with the club. Under his already known coach Dag-Eilev Fagermo, he made his debut as a substitute in the first game on March 30, 2013 against Sandnes Ulf . In the course of the 2014 game year , Akabueze alternated as a left and right winger, but also played a few games as a center forward and made three hits and in a total of 29 championship appearances, of which he was rarely on the lawn for the full 90 minutes as many assists. For large parts of the Tippeligaen 2014, Bentley with the Odds BK was at the top of the table and for a long time was also in second place with the team. It was only in the last championship game that the Grenland club slipped to third place in the table, but secured a place in the first qualifying round for the 2015/16 UEFA Europa League . Furthermore, he and his team made it to the final of the Norwegian Football Cup 2014 and lost to Molde FK with 0: 2. Akabueze himself was in all seven cup games, scored two goals and did the preparatory work for another goal.

Europa League qualification with the Odds BK

The game 2015 Bentley started as a regular player on the left outside and took when he had finished with the team already about half of the football year, at the said Europe League qualification part. After victories over Sheriff Tiraspol in the first, the Shamrock Rovers in the second and the IF Elfsborg in the third qualifying round , Akabueze and his team met Borussia Dortmund in the qualifying play-offs . After a narrow 3: 4 defeat in the first leg, the Germans won the second leg by a clear 7: 2, after which Odds BK was eliminated with a total score of 5:11. After he had already played successfully on the right wing in the second leg against IF Elfsborg and had occasionally contributed a goal in the 2-0 win, Dag-Eilev Fagermo also used him in the championship mainly on the right wing. By the end of the year, the 1.80 m tall winger had played in all 30 championship games, scored eight goals and seven assists and placed fourth in the final standings with Odds BK, which meant another Europa League qualification participation . In the Norwegian Cup 2015 , he made it through to the quarter-finals with the team, losing 2-1 to Sarpsborg 08 FF . Akabueze completed four of the possible missions and came up with a goal and an assist.

The Nigerian played mainly as a right-winger in the following game year, 2016 , and was rarely used in other offensive positions. With the team he had played his way to the top positions early on and with Odds BK was permanently in second place behind Rosenborg Trondheim over a period of several months . After half of the championship had been completed again, Odds BK started the first qualifying round for the 2016/17 UEFA Europa League . After advancing against IFK Mariehamn , with Bentley making an assist in the first leg and scoring in the second leg, the team was narrowly eliminated against PAS Ioannina in the second qualifying round . After a 3-0 defeat in the first leg, he and his team made it 3-0 in the regular time of the second leg, but were then defeated in extra time. The league finished Akabueze with the Odds BK in third place behind the runner-up Brann Bergen and the master Rosenborg Trondheim. Again he was in all 30 league games and came up with seven goals and as many assists this year. In addition, there were three goals and an assist, which he had scored in four appearances in the Norwegian Cup in 2016 , when he and the team were narrowly defeated in the round of 16 against Tromsø IL . Shortly after the end of the season, Nigerian media reported that Bentley was being courted by clubs from the United States , Poland and the Moldovan club Sheriff Tiraspol.

Change to Turkey

At the end of January 2017, Akabueze moved abroad, whereupon the former Nigerian international moved to the Turkish second division team Boluspor , with whom he signed for a year and a half. Bentley initially found it difficult to find a place in the team under Fuat Çapa and was therefore initially only on the substitute bench, from which he only came irregularly for short appearances. On April 7, 2017, his first fourth short appearance, the right winger scored the decisive goal in the 94th minute in a 1-0 home win over Göztepe Izmir , after only coming onto the field in minute 73. Soon afterwards he developed into a regular player on the right outside and completed a few games over the full playing time by the end of the season. In the final ranking of the TFF 1. Lig 2016/17 he ranked fourth in the table with Boluspor, which meant participation in the play-offs. Bentley himself had been in eleven league games by then and had contributed three goals and one assist. In the play-off semi-finals, which were played in a return match against Göztepe Izmir, he and his team lost with a total score of 0: 4.

Bentley started as a regular on the right wing in the following season 2017/18 , but was used after only a few rounds by Çapa on the left wing and in the attacking midfield. After Boluspor had won only two games of the first nine championship games, in which Akabueze scored one goal each, there was a change of coach. Under the new coach, the former professional player Sait Karafırtınalar , Bentley remained a regular player, but had to accept a few changes in position over the course of the season. With Karafırtınalar Boluspor returned to the road to success and only lost five of his subsequent 25 league games by the end of the season. By then Akabueze had made 32 of 34 possible appearances and had a record of four goals and five assists. In the final table of the TFF 1. Lig Boluspor ranked three points behind MKE Ankaragücü and nine points behind Çaykur Rizespor in third place in the table. In the semi-finals of the play-offs, the team lost to Gazişehir Gaziantep FK with a total score of 1: 4. In addition, the Nigerian also made two appearances in the Turkish Football Cup 2017/18 this season , where the round of 16 against Akhisar Belediyespor ended ; overall he got a goal and an assist.

After his contract, which expired in the summer of 2018, was extended for another year to June 30, 2019 in February 2018, he also acted as a regular for the club from the Bolu province in the 2018/19 season . Almost exclusively as an attacking midfielder, Akabueze contributed a few goals under Karafırtınalar and Orhan Kaynak , who replaced Karafırtınalar as coach at the end of January 2019. To date (as of May 10, 2019), the former national player has played 30 games, scored eight goals and made five assists. He also played in six games of the Turkish Cup 2018/19 and scored one goal; Boluspor was eliminated in the round of 16 against Galatasaray Istanbul .

National team career

As an 18-year-old Akabueze took part in the 2007 U-20 World Cup in Canada with his home country . Here he was selected by John Obuh in the three group matches against Costa Rica , Japan and Scotland used and managed as second in Group F a place in the final round . In the 2-1 victory over Zambia in the round of 16 , Akabueze scored the decisive goal in the 57th minute of the game to make it 2-1 and brought his team, the 2005 runners-up , to the quarter-finals . The game against Chile was lost after a 0-0 after regular time with 0-4 in extra time.

A little over a month before his participation in the U-20 World Cup, Akabueze made his debut on May 27, 2007 for the senior team of his home country . In the friendly against Kenya he was used from the start and scored the only goal of the game in the 38th minute. Six days later, he played another international match for Nigeria in qualifying for the Africa Cup of 2008 . In the Group 3 game against Uganda , he came on in the 77th minute for Rabiu Afolabi . This was also his last appearance in the Nigerian national soccer team.

successes

with Odd Grenland

• Master of the Adeccoligaen and promotion to the Tippeligaen : 2008

with Brann Bergen

• Norwegian Men's Football Cup finalist : 2011

Web links

Commons : Chukwuma Akabueze  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Bentley in the database of National-Football-Teams.com (English)
• Bentley in the database of transfermarkt.de
• Bentley in the database of footballdatabase.eu (English)
• Bentley in the mackolik.com database (Turkish)
• Bentley on nifs.no (Norwegian)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} Chukwuma Akabueze on the official website of Boluspor (Turkish), accessed on May 10, 2019
2. ↑ CHUKWUMA AKABUEZE 'My movement to Turkey was God-ordained' , accessed on May 10, 2019
3. ↑ ^{a b} BRANN I DIALOG MED ODD OM BENTLEY (Norwegian), accessed on May 8, 2019
4. ↑ ^{a b c d} Official: CHUKWUMA AKABUEZE to SK Brann (English), accessed on May 8, 2019
5. ↑ 卓尔 签 尼日利亚 新锐 国脚 (Chinese), accessed May 9, 2019
6. ↑ ^{a b} Bentley is back! ( Memento of July 31, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) (Norwegian), accessed on May 9, 2019
7. ↑ Exclusive: FC Sheriff Tiraspol Ahead Of MLS, Polish Clubs In Race For Chuks (English), accessed on May 10, 2019
8. ↑ Akabueze drums support for Kwara United , accessed May 10, 2019