The Nigeria Cricket Federations (NCF) has said it’s ready to approach the organisers of next year’s National Sports Festival with the view to allow cricket feature in the festival.
The federation said the festival is a potent platform they could use to project the image of the sport in the country.
The Chairman, Media Committee of the NCF Kayode Adeniyi disclosed that the Board of the Cricket Federation will soon visit Calabar to meet with the Sports Commissioner and the State Director of sports to discuss the prospects of having cricket as one of the sports in the festival.
“Since we came on board, we’ve made efforts to see how to make the game gain grounds in Nigeria. Though, we have our road map on how we want to achieve our goals, we also feel that the National Sports festival will be a good platform to sell the game to the minds of Nigerians.
“We shall be meeting with all those concerned with the hosting the game and we pray that they will see sense in what we are saying,” Adeniyi said.
As part of the preparatory measures, Adeniyi said they would be donating cricket equipment and would also partner with the state Cricket Association to organise a coaching clinic among schools and basic coaching courses for sports officers in Calabar.
He said the NCF will provide technical support in the development of pitches while the host is expected to provide the facilities. The federations will also include coaching personnel from Cross River in future coaching courses.
Adeniyi added that since so many states have started playing cricket, getting enough representation to participate at the festival will not be a challenge.
