Sports
Benin Emerges Copa Cup Zonal Championsa
The Benin U-16 Coca-Cola Football team has
lifted the zone C trophy – the Coco-Cola Copa Cup.
To emerge champions, the Benin team
defeated Enugu, 2-0 in the finals played at the Samuel Ogbemudia Stadium.
The organisers of the tournament said they
used the FIFA Youth Football competition format of a round robin and knockout,
to select the champions of Zone C.
The zonal finals had four cities in
attendance, Benin, Asaba, Imo and Enugu.
The Benin zonal champions would now compete for medals and cash prizes at the
national finals to be staged at the Teslim Balogun Stadium, Lagos on May 27,
which is to coincide with the Children’s Day.
An ex-international, Waidi Akani, one of
the ambassadors of the tournament, advised the Nigeria Football Federation
(NFF) to deploy an ex-international to the region to scout for raw young
talents.
In an interview with newsmen Akani, who was also the celebrity coach for
the Benin Zone, rated the competition high saying that the standard of the
games was impressive.
On how to groom the discovered talents, he
said: “we need to put their details on our database and follow their progress.
“Without this, we can’t achieve the aim for
which such competitions are organised.
“And this is why the NFF needs to send the
ex-internationals to regions and zones to scout for young raw talents because
everybody cannot be at the national level.
“The federation can deploy
ex-internationals to the different zones and through this method create jobs
for them to fish out talents, who will continually fill up the gaps in all the
national age group teams.
“This is what is obtainable elsewhere but
not in Nigeria,’’ he said, stressing regrettably, “it is at the federation
level that everybody wants to be. It should not be so. We should be in the
regions and zones.
“When I came here to Benin, I looked for
ex-internationals like Victor Igbinoba, Baldwin Bazuaye, Emmanuel Okocha and
Monday Eguavoen to help me out with selections.
He noted: “the worst mistake the federation
had made was in doing away with ex-internationals who had done well in the past
for the country.
“The federation needs to emphasise the need
to scout for ex-internationals and get them employed, so that they can operate from regions and zones.
The
project manager Coca-cola Youth Soccer championship Femi Adelusi, said the
essence of the competition was to connect, engage and promote talents of teens
and young adults on a distinctive platform.
A well-known football pundit in the State, Chief Christopher Okonkwo has lauded the efforts and vision of the Super Eagles Coach Eric Chelle for going from one venue of the Nigeria Domestic Nigeria Professional Football League match to the other in monitoring Nigerian players, with a view to invite some exceptional good one discovered into the main stream of the Super Eagles team.
Okonkwo, who made the commendation in an interview at the Port Harcourt Club recently, described the positive move by Coach Chelle as a good step in the right direction, noting that the practice was how its been done in the past among any contracted coach assigned to tinker the Super Eagles team.
“Truly, it has been an old tradition in the country seeing any newly engaged Coach to lead the National team, visiting some our Nigeria League venues during the league matches to spot light some good talents that could be used to beef up some grey areas in the department of Eagles team”
He, however, frowned at the current situation where our coaches had continously been over depending on the use of foreign based players during invitation of players to the National camp, thereby, relegating the domestic home based league players to the background as if they have nothing much to offer to the team.
“I can vividly recall that the likes of great players in the mode of Finidi George, Taribo West, Kanu Nwankwo, Austin Okocha, Richard Owobokiri, Emmanuel Osuigwe among others started from Nigeria football league before they graduated to play in Europe through which they later invited to Super Eagles camp to represent Nigeria”
“Besides, I’m also of the view that going to secondary school football competitive games could equally serves as a a good platform to discover budding talents that could be nurtured to become great stars in near future”, Okonkwo frankly added.
Okonkwo, therefore, prayed that any football coach to be engaged by the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF) to tinker the Super Eagles should be told not to confine himself in staying in big hotel alone but to be visiting some of our local league match venues, with a view to discover some good players that can be drafted into the Super Eagles team.
“Indeed, I stand to be challenged that there some young good players in the Nigeria Professional League. If spotted and exposed, could give the some of the invited foreign based players a stiff competitive fight in securing a postion in the team”, Okonkwo emphatically stated.
Ezechukwu, one of the youngest members of the Nigerian contingent at the championship in Ghana, said her ambition was to win the 100m title in style and cap it with a new personal record.
The fresh secondary school graduate explained that she is fully focused on contributing to Team Nigeria’s medal hopes and is determined to deliver strong performances across her events.
“My main objective in Ghana is to clinch the 100m title and the 4×100m,” Ezechukwu told Tidesports source.
“Nigeria can be assured of my very best and my commitment to the Team. I would love to set a new personal best in Ghana, but anything that comes, I will take it. The spirit in the team is high, and I think we are ready to go,” she said.
Ezechukwu, who was part of Nigeria’s women’s 4x100m relay squad at the World Relays in Botswana, said the experience gained from that competition has strengthened her mindset heading into the continental championships.
She admitted that she learned valuable lessons from her previous outing, including a difficult moment during the relay where an early error affected the team’s rhythm, but said she has used the experience to improve her discipline and composure.
“The secret is just being disciplined, training hard and trusting my coach and believing in God, and the result will show,” she added.
The teenager is part of a 41-member Nigerian team comprising 24 female and 17 male athletes competing at the championships, which begin today at the University of Ghana, Legon.
Nigeria are expected to compete across multiple track and field events as they aim for a strong finish against the continent’s elite athletes.
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