The Technical Director,
Nigeria Wheelchair Basketball Federation (NWBF), Obereniene Adoki, has expressed confidence that Nigeria could clinch Africa’s lone slot at the Wheelchair Basketball qualifier in Angola.
Adoki told newsmen in Lagos that the qualifier would hold from October 22 to November 3 in Luanda, Angola, for the 2014 World Cup in South Korea.
The director said that his players had been in camp in Lagos since the past two weeks and had just moved to Ibadan for another three-week camping.
“For the past two weeks, we have been in open camp in Lagos but we just moved to Ibadan for the second stage of our camping.
We did this to expose our players to a different kind of weather, reduce distractions and make them more focused, so that we can achieve the desired results at the qualifier,” he said.
According to him, the last one week of the camping would be used to select the players for the qualifier, adding that the team would take off to Luanda from Ibadan.
“In Ibadan, we will spend the next three weeks to get our boys acclimatised to different weather, while the last one week will be for the selection of players,” he said.
Adoki added that although the federation had concluded all arrangements for the qualifier in its first phase of the camping, the second phase is to strengthen the team for the qualifier.
He added that meanwhile, some invited professional players had arrived at the camp, while more were still being expected.
“Among those professionals that had arrived are the captain, Tope Ogunyemi from Australia, Mohammed from Poland and Richard from the US,” he said.
The director then advised other physically-challenged people to join their colleague in the federation, saying that the sky was the limit for them to excel in the game.
He also enjoined corporate bodies and public-spirited individuals to support the team to win the slot, saying that it was not too late for them to lend their support.