The sport federation president however expressed happiness that all that would be a thing of the past as the new board of the federation is collaborating with Dollfil Prima food and sooner than later Cricket will be a house hold name among Nigerian schools.
He said with the support of the company, the Cricket federation last year introduced the national secondary schools tournament which is one of the avenues for discovering and developing talents.
His words: “In the past twelve years, there was the absence of a national programme at the schools levels but thanks to sponsorship of Dollfills Prima foods, last year we were able to introduce the national secondary schools tournament. That is the avenue for development of budding talents at the grassroots”.
Furthermore, he said in order to arouse interest and develop talents, the federation has been organising periodic coaching clinics across the country.
He said now that the zonal representatives on the board are in place, they also have the responsibility of ensuring that grassroots cricket development is taken more seriously at the zonal levels with the support from the federation.
“The zonal representatives on the board are now in place. They also have the responsibility of ensuring that grassroots development is taken more seriously at the zonal level” he maintained
He said in selected schools across the country, programmes have been designed and coaches are sent to go round and take the children in Cricket because the sport has been made part of the curriculum.
The president named schools like Atlantic Hall School Epe in Lagos, White Sand schools in Lekki and Middle Hall in Lekki as some of the schools that are being used for pilot programmes in bringing up the game in these schools.
Sagoe said the success of the pilot programme in the aforementioned schools will determine if it will subsequently be extended to other schools across the states to serve the federation’s grassroots oriented programme.
