Nigeria's Olympic squad has arrived in Australia, to defend their title from Atlanta. But so far at least, Kanu isn't with them. And the latest quotes from the camp aren't quite as adversarial as they have been recently.

'We have a 50 per cent possibility that he will come,' said one Nigerian official. 'But whatever happens, I don't think it will affect the team much. He is one of 18 players, he's not the whole team.'

And now the BBC report an unnamed NFA official as saying that Kanu has written to them asking to be left out. "The secretariat received Kanu's letter at the weekend... he gave several reasons why he should be left out of the Olympics. We are very unhappy about this development... the player had given his word that he would play in Sydney".

So, 50-50 looks optmistic now, from the Nigerian perspective.