The Head of Coaching, Rivers State Sports Council, Evangelist Ezekiel Ordu, has promised that the state would emerge champions in the forthcoming 19th National Sports Festival scheduled to hold in Calabar next year.

He however, stated that the achievement would only be possible if the needs of athletes and coaches were given urgent attention by the authorities.

According to Ordu, who stated this in an exclusive interview in Port Harcurt last week, it is sad that some major and medal winning sports such as basketball and kickboxing lack regular fully employed coaches by the state.

“You can imagine a situation where a coach will not have a source of income yet expected to be regular to training. He also scouts for athletes preparing them for competitions as to make the state proud, only to go home to his family with nothing to show for his hardwork,” he said.

He however, thanked the Sports Council management for the recent conversion of few of their trained coaches, adding that the department is also planning to beef up the coaching crew with some matured athletes to further cover areas that need coaches.

The HOD continued that some of the sports have no facility to train and some are on a borrowed facility, thereby moving from one venue to another.

He thus appealed to the state government to expedite the completion of the facilities that are under construction and release the already completed ones to the sports council to reduce facility constraint.

Earlier, he called for early preparations ahead of the 19th NSF, saying that, it is important to start on time.

“Early camping could serve as a primary assessment for coaches and sports associations in readiness for the National Sports fiesta billed to hold next year in Calabar.