Rugby: Nigeria Prepares For Olympic Qualifiers At England Camp
Nigeria’s senior men’s Rugby team, the Black Stallions, are in England ahead of the next month’s Paris 2024 Olympic Games qualifiers in Mauritius, the Nigeria Rugby Football Federation (NRFF) announced.
The Black Stallions will face Ghana, Burundi, and DR Congo with Nigeria targeting a top three finish to earn a move to the next phase of the series, which is the Africa Cup Sevens tournament slated for Zimbabwe in September 2023.
According to NRFF General Manager, Azeez Ladipo, the foreign-based players selected for the qualifiers would be joined by their home-based counterparts in the United Kingdom to begin preparations for the qualifiers.
“The UK camp is to enable the foreign-based players have easy access to converge and prepare for the games without stress,” Ladipo said.
“More details on the preparations would be announced this week by the Rugby Federation.”
Nigeria will open their campaign against Ghana, before meeting Burundi and DR Congo in their last Group A match of the qualifiers.
The Black Stallions began their preparation for the qualifiers in early May, with the convergence of players based in the United Kingdom under Coach Temitope Okenla.
Newly-appointed Black Stallions coach, Steve Lewis, has been supervising other players based in Europe, United States of America and Nigeria.
The bulk of the selected players are expected to go into a closed camp before travelling to Mauritius for the first phase of the qualifiers.
The Mauritius leg of the qualifiers will hold on June 24th – 25th, 2023, with 12 countries in competition for the available four slots in the Africa Cup Sevens tournament.
The participating countries are Mauritius, Cote d’Ivoire, Ghana, Botswana, Cameroun, Algeria and Nigeria. Others are Burundi, Congo, Lesotho, Senegal and Egypt.
Chidi Nwoke/Obinna Aniakor.
