There is a soaring spirit in the camp of the national badminton team as they prepare for the Africa Badminton Championships which comes up from April 22 -28th in Port Harcourt, Rivers State.
Eighteen countries already have registered for this year’s event which will see the top male and female badminton players slug it out for brilliance. The countries are: Algeria, Benin, Botswana, Congo, Congo DRC, Eritrea, Egypt, Ghana, Ivory Coast and Kenya.
Others are Mauritius, Seychelles, South Africa, Togo, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe and Nigeria as the Host.
Team Nigeria athletes are camped at the High Performance Center in the University of Port Harcourt, Rivers State to get them fully ready for the championship.
“We have been camped here for the past three weeks, and the tournament starts in the next 18 days, I think from the look of things and what the players have displayed we are rightly and equally prepared for the tournament,” assistant coach of the team, George Shitta told ChinaAcheru.com.
He confirmed that the team looked shaped and was indeed very optimistic of hosting and winning this year’s Africa Badminton Championship.
He also revealed that most of the players that represented the country in Algeria the last time out are still in the team and to him the composure of the players is even better now as compared to then. Nigeria finished in second place in Algeria and the coach believes they have the best team Nigeria can produce at this point in time.
“Yes they are the best. Before the names were published, all the players underwent some trials. They played among themselves and the best 18 was selected from the 30 players in camp.
The captain of the side Enajoh Abah, happy that the fitness level of his team mates has improved tremendously, believes “everybody is in top form and ready for the tournament”.
Abah’s dream is to see Team Nigeria as a team and then win the tournament.
“The first is to play as a team so we can win the team events which is our priority, before the singles and double which I believe we can win 2 gold medals,” He told ChinaAcheru.com.
