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OPEIFA Cup: Former Players Plead For Championships For School Leavers

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Participants in the previous annual Lagos State Secondary Schools Handball Championships, tagged “OPEIFA CUP’,’ have appealed to Kayode Opeifa to initiate equivalent competitions for school leavers.
Babatunde Taiwo and Babatunde Kehinde, four-time participants and graduates of the annual championships, made the call in an interview with newsmen, Thursday, in Lagos on the ongoing competition.
Tidesports source reports that the OPEIFA CUP is an annual Lagos State Handball Association (LSHA) programme put in place to discover and nurture players from the grassroots.
The championships sponsored by Kayode Opeifa, a patron of LSHA, which was initiated in 2015 for boys and girls have held uninterruptedly and now in its 5th edition.
The Babatunde twins, who recently completed their secondary school education from Wesley Girls Senior High School, Sabo, Yaba, were members of the school team and regular participants in OPEIFA CUP.
Taiwo, a player told newsmen that the call became necessary as players that had graduated from secondary schools were no longer eligible for the tournament.
She said there was need to have a similar championships that would engage players that fell in such category to enable them strengthen their experiences acquired from the competition.
The highest goal scorer and MVP awarded player of the 3rd and 4th editions of OPEIFA CUP, tied her success in handball so far to regular participation in the tournament.
“Handball has become a fast growing sport in Lagos, especially since the OPEIFA CUP started in 2015 and the championships hold every year for public and private secondary schools.
“OPEIFA CUP has helped my twin sister and I to come to limelight and I have won three awards in the tournament but can no longer participate because we have graduated from secondary school.
“It was a wonderful experience passing through OPEIFA CUP and I am very grateful to Daddy Opeifa for all his support which has made my carreer meaningful.
“We are aspiring to go higher and appealing to Daddy Opeifa to introduce another championships for those of us that have left secondary schools to sustain our competition spirit,” she said.

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Bundesliga: Kane Scores Hat-Trick As Bayern End Winless Streak

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England captain Harry Kane netted a hat-trick to guide Bayern Munich to an impressive victory against Stuttgart.
Kane’s goals, plus one from Kingsley Coman, helped Bayern end a three-game winless run in all competitions.
They faced a tough task against a Stuttgart side who sat back and limited their chances, leading Vincent Kompany’s side to enter the break frustrated and with the deadlock unbroken.
Bayern eventually found a way past Stuttgart’s steely defence when Kane drilled a low effort into the bottom corner from around 30 yards out after Joshua Kimmich overturned possession.

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Dosu Survives Ghastly Accident, Again

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Former Nigeria goalkeeper, Dosu Joseph, is full of thanks to God after he miraculously survived another life-threatening automobile accident recent at Kara, along the Lagos-Ibadan Express Way, where a heavy-duty truck ran into his SUV.
Narrating his ordeal, the 51-year-old, who guided Nigeria to gold in the Men’s Football Tournament of the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, broke the news in a statement on his social media handles on Friday.
“To God be the glory, another death escaped by Grace and Mercy of God. Me and my friend SM were at Enyo Filling Station after Ojodu Berger bus stop to get fuel on Wednesday, October 2, 2024, around 6 p.m. when this MACK truck fully loaded with iron, with registration number LND 470 XX, left the road and crushed my car beyond repairs. Thank God for life,” he stated.
This is the second time the soft-spoken club proprietor will cheat death by a whisker, having been involved in an accident in 1997 that ended his career at 23 and left his spinal cord in bad shape.
He helped Julius Berger win the Nigeria FA Cup in November 1997 shortly a memorable Olympic outing by keeping a clean sheet in the finals against Katsina United. The following year, he was involved in the auto along Ikorodu Road, Lagos, which not only cut his career short but also left him almost paralysed, ending his spell at Serie A club Reggiana.
The former Nigeria international, who also kept goal for Julius Berger FC, said the case has been reported to Isheri Police Station, Ogun State, where the driver is currently detained and the truck also seized.
According to him, the owner of the truck said he can’t fix the badly damaged SUV until after a year.

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Sports Development Going Down In Nigeria – Ex-International

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Ex – Super Eagles of Nigeria, Okwuchukwu Waobikeze has observed that sports development in Nigeria is going down.
According to him, grassroots sports is very important, without it, the administrators cannot get it right. So everybody should key into grassroots sports development, he said.
Waobikeze said this last Wednesday in an interview with sports journalists shortly after the Port Harcourt All Stars Independence football festival (OCTOBERFEST) at the Port Harcourt club, Rivers State.
He explained that for sports administrators to get it right, grassroots development is key. “They should be organising competition at the grassroots level to fish out the young ones for different sporting activities.
“Grassroots sports is very important so the administrators have to go back to the grassroots.
” Sports Development in Nigeria is going down we need to go back to the basics.
“Look at the just concluded Paris Olympics, Nigeria did not win any medal.
” Our football team did not even qualify for the Olympics. We are going down.
” If they should go back to the grassroots, they will get young ones in the games and talents will be developed.
” I started from school games, to youth games before playing for the national team. Now everybody wants to fly board to play professional football and a lot do not know the basics of the game.
” A lot of people did not know the little things about the game, they just want to play. It is not done so,” Waobikeze stated.

Kiadum Edookor

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