NSF: Netball will be restored to national sports – Secretary says

The General Secretary, Nigeria Netball Federation (NNF), Oluwatoyin Aluko on Wednesday said that the federation was working towards the restoration of netball to the sports festival in Nigeria.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that Aluko is the coordinator of the netball demonstration match at the ongoing 2022 National Sports Festival (NSF) in Asaba.

Aluko, a retired netball player, gave the hint in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Asaba.

She described netball as one of the early sports played in Nigeria before independence.

“Netball came into Nigeria in the 50’s before independence and it was a prominent game in the 60’s and 70’s, the period I also played the game.

“All of a sudden, handball and basketball took over because there was no structure for netball to coordinate.

“Now, we are aware that netball is a Commonwealth game and compulsory.

“Nigeria is a member of Commonwealth and this informed the need for us to come back and restart the game in Nigeria,’’ she said.

Aluko said that the demonstration match was part of efforts at ensuring that  the game of netball was fully recognised as a national sport in Nigeria.

“For netball to be a scoring sport, we must have a demonstration match and at least two-third of the states of the Federation must be involved.

“We have to take the first step of having a demonstration match and the next step to have coaching clinics.

“We have some of the technical directors and coaches at the 2022 NSF.

“Sometimes last year, an organisation in the UK gave the former netball players some equipment which I was also a beneficiary.

“We have distributed to about 10 states, we also constructed a netball court in Abuja and started training players,“he said.

She said that players that were trained in Abuja were part of the demonstration match at the 2022 National Sports Festival.

Aluko said the federation would soon roll out plans and would be expecting the states to erect their netball rings and to make the game popular.

“Those playing basketball and handball have a rudimentary knowledge of handball.

“We have donated equipment to 12 states with Delta taking the lead. I want to assure that the game of netball has come to stay,’’ she said.

The Director of Competition, Kweku Tandor, stated that the federation had got the approval for netball to be re-introduced as a national sport in Nigeria.

“We have got approval for netball to be accredited as one of the sports in the NSF.

“The final approval will be given by the Ministry of Sports after two demonstration matches have been played.

“The appreciation of netball has been encouraging, anyways, we have lots of interests from promoters.

“It is a sport that should be attractive to sponsors because we have children involved and young girls.

“It is a sport that if enough work is put in place, there won’t be any difficulty in getting sponsors for the game,’’ he said.

Tandor described netball as a developmental sport in Nigeria with its own rules.

“We have new sets of players that are picked from other related sport, this is because it has just been introduced.

“We are further going down to the schools, so that everyone can learn about the game. We will have the team for netball different from other sports.

“The rules are straightforward and easier to learn than basketball, the promoters have started training their referees and coaches who will go down to the states and teach them.

“We are quite pleased with the demonstration match at this festival; I believe that Nigeria can raise a formidable team in netball, if we can do it in other sports.’’

NAN reports that a demonstration netball match was played between Team Dare and Team Okowa at the Stephen Keshi Stadium.

Team Okowa defeated Team Dare by 11-7. (NAN) (ww