Coach Wants NSC To Pay Attention To Basketball

Coach of the national U-19 women basketball team, Adewunmi Aderemi, has called on the National Sports Commission (NSC) to pay attention to basketball “as it does to football”.

Aderemi, who is also coach of Lagos-based First Bank basketball team, made the call early this week  in Abuja in an interview with newsmen.

He claimed that the government was paying more attention to football and was ready to spend millions of naira on the game to the detriment of other sports.

Aderemi pointed out that the Nigerian national women team had won the All Africa Games basketball title three times but had yet to get the deserved attention.

“This is something that should have ordinarily attracted the attention of government in terms of the provision of indoor facilities for the sport.

“But regrettably, and in spite of the commendable progress recorded by the team, government prefers to pay more attention to football,’’ he said on the sidelines of the ongoing 7th Zenith Bank Women’s Basketball League.

Aderemi said that while Nigeria was one of the countries to participate in the World Basketball Championship in July in Chile, “government has yet to show much interest in our preparations’’.

He, however, said that in spite of the fact that Nigeria would be participating in the championship for the first time, the national team would do its best.

10 teams are participating in the ongoing Zenith Bank Women’s Basketball League, which is taking place at the Indoor Sports Hall of the Abuja National Stadium.