Former tactician of National Basketball team, Alabi Adelanwa has blamed the not too impressive outing of Team-Nigeria at the recently concluded 2020 Olympic in Tokyo, Japan on bad condition of facilities in the country and those he described as mediocre running various sports federations
Nigeria finished in the distant 74th position on the medals table with just a silver won by Blessing Oborududu in wrestling and bronze by Ese Brume in the long jump field event, and emerged sixth among African countries behind Kenya in the 19th position with four gold while USA won the game with 39gold, China in second position with 38 gold, host Japan in the third position with 27gold and Great Britain came fourth with 22 gold
Adelanwa who lauded the Nigerian athletes for putting up good performances despite the noticeable shortcomings, told Edu-Biznews on Tuesday in a chat in Abeokuta, the Ogun State Capital that the country lacks the needed first-class facilities and well Coordinated training programmes to develop and prepare the athletes for the olympic and other major Competitions
"We don't have good structure on ground to prepare athletes in the country in other countries they have square pec in square hole but in Nigeria who are those in charge of administration of sports ?,he asked
The veteran coach who discovered the likes of NBA legends including, Akeem Olajuwon and D'Tigers' former captain, Olumide Oyedeji, says the culture of not appreciating the exploits of past heroes is discouraging the present crop of athletes from giving their best to the nation
He stressed the need to change such attitude by celebrating our heroes and heroins and begin to appoint qualified sports administrators who would put in place developmental programmes to discover and nurture talented athletes to stardom
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"We don't have developmental programmes to discover talents from tender age and nurture them to stardom, when we have first class facilities to train youngsters, coaches will be encouraged to work and develop these young athletes", he said
On the way forward for sports in Nigeria, the Owu-Abeokuta born technocrat called on the Federal Government and Ogun State Government in particular to invest massively on provision of first class facilities to encourage the country's top professionals to train with local athletes and players at home to build a solid Team-Nigeria for the future
Adelanwa also insisted on the inclusion of Seasoned administrators including the likes of Engr. Musa Kida who is currently in charge of the Nigeria Basketball Federation NBBF and doing well, to run various sports federation, not mediocre who lobby for appointment and only interested in financial gains and not for the development of sports in the country
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