….Team List expected this week as stakeholders encourage youths to play Cricket and benefit from discipline and good education
By Michael Egiethua
The Nigerian Under 19 male team is set to release its team list for the 2024 International Cricket Council (ICC) Africa Qualifiers Division 2 Men’s Championship scheduled to take place in Tanzania between July 31 and 14 August, 2024.
Daniel Danladi Gim, the National Under 19 men’s coach, while speaking to Crossfire Reports on Sunday June 30, at the last training session of the team at the Cricket Club Abuja Oval, inside Package “B” of the Moshood Abiola Stadium in Abuja, said Nigeria will be competing against 7 African countries namely, host Tanzania, Ghana, Rwanda, Botswana, Seirra Leone, Malawi, Mozambique.
On the plans for young Nigerians who have never had any contact with the game of cricket and the prospect of having them introduced to the game and perhaps become future champions, Mr. Gim said the best way to get young players into the Cricket net is to have the game introduced to them in schools at an early age, having inter schools’ competitions, interstate competitions, national level competitions, as well as having the coaches and current players work harder to be able to impact knowledge and skills of the game to such a catchment demography to give them a future in the game.
FOR NIGERIA TO GET TO WORLD STAGE WE NEED MORE SPONSORS – ENESI JUNIOR
Also speaking to Crossfire Reports, ICC Certified Umpire (Cricket Referee), Mr. Enesi Junior said for Nigeria to emerge at the world top cricket stage, we will need more sponsors. He thanked companies like PwC for their sponsorship of the National Under 17 championship but added that we need up to 5 sponsors for such age grade competitions to create the opportunities for the youths to be well exposed before international competitions.
He gave example of a country like Namibia where they have over 10, 12 local competitions from under 7 to Under 12, Under 15, Club Championships and their Franchises. He said this is called Local Content and that Nigeria needs to up its games in local content, creating enough local competitions.
Another aspect that needs attention according to Enesi is the area of High Performance which he said Nigeria is already making progress.
Youths Stand to gain Discipline and Education if they play Cricket
Enesi Junior also said our youths across the country stand to benefit from the gains of discipline and a good education if they play Cricket and it is a tradition for Cricketers to be disciplined and well educated. He said when you play cricket you will learn discipline first and foremost and most importantly, you’ll be encouraged to go to school as we all know that after Cricket, what next?
