Stylistic Analysis of Metaphor, Hyperbole, and Evaluative Language in Nigerian Online

This study examines the use of metaphor, hyperbole, and evaluative language in Nigerian online sports media coverage of the 2025–2026 Premier League season, with particular attention to their communicative and rhetorical functions in the construction of sporting narratives and evaluative positions. The study adopts a qualitative stylistic research design. A corpus of 100 stylistic expressions was identified from five online sports platforms: Complete Sports, Premium Times, BBC Sports, Goal.com, and Pulse Nigeria. From the corpus, 30 analytically rich excerpts comprising 10 metaphorical, 10 hyperbolic, and 10 evaluative expressions were purposively selected for detailed analysis. The data were analysed through qualitative content analysis and stylistic analysis, with Appraisal Theory providing the principal framework for interpreting evaluative meaning. The findings indicate that metaphor provides conceptual frames through which football is represented in terms of warfare, medicine, nature, machinery, recovery, and narrative development. Hyperbole intensifies the perceived magnitude, significance, or emotional force of sporting events, while evaluative language explicitly positions players, teams, performances, and outcomes along positive or negative value scales. The study shows that these stylistic resources work complementarily in Nigerian online sports journalism and help construct football as a discourse of competition, excellence, failure, resilience, achievement, and spectacle.