The General Manager, Shooting Stars Sports Club (3SC) of Ibadan, Mutiu Adepoju has said that the National Sports Festival (NSF) had not full achieved its objective of discovering talents.

The festival, which began in 1973, was not only aimed at discovering talents at the grassroots but to nurture them to national and international stardom.

Adepoju, in an interview with newsmen said that the aims of the festival in his opinion in recent years, have not been achieved.

“A glaring example of the failure of the sports festival was the country’s inability to get talents that would represent the country in international competitions like the Olympics.

“Talents discovered at the various sports festival held in the past should have been well trained and properly nurtured to represent the country in competitions like the Olympics,” he said.

The 3SC manager said it was sad that 39 years after the festival’s inception, Nigeria was still unable to groom outstanding athletes for major international competitions.

The manager then called on the festival’s Main Organising Committee to ensure that the competitions were organized in a way that would help in talent discovery.

The 18th edition of the festival tagged: “Eko 2012,” will hold between November 27 and December 9.