A notable Islamic cleric in Nigeria, Ustaadh Sulaymon Adeyanju, has urged Muslim youths across the globe to desist from watching football.

The Islamic cleric spoke at Oduduwa College, in Ile-Ife, on Sunday, in a public lecture organised by the Standard Bearers Islamic Organisation (SB), Osun State branch.

Adeyanju explained that contemporary scholars have opined that watching football is like associating partner with Allah because Muslims worshiping football have put full concentration to watching football than worshipping Allah.

He said: “The reason contemporary scholars opined that watching football is Toogut (having another partner with Allah) is because if football is in the period of Salat, they will first worship football before worshipping Allah.

“If one wants to worship Allah, it needs full concentration. Now look at those watching football, they have concentrated their minds on football and having less concentration to Allah.

“For example, I heard that an Imam wanted to end salat. Instead of the Imam to say Asalam alaikum, he shouted goal. Just imagine, if it could get to that extent for an Imam, what do we say about his congregation?

“Our primary assignment as Muslims is to worship Allah. Everything that can hinder the worship, Muslims must run away from it because we don’t know when death comes.

“The prophet said that out of four major things Allah will ask on the day of judgement is time, especially the time of the youth. As a result, we must be careful of what we use our youthful age to do.

“If you look at the history of Islam, the major people that strived for the development of Islam are youths. Umar Bn Khattab started to represent his family in all activities at the age of 18.

“The Muslim youths are the hope of the world. They must therefore be careful of time. And they should desist from wasting their time to watch football.”

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