Lagos, March 8, 2011 (NAN) Obisia Nwankpa, Head Coach, Nigeria Boxing Federation (NBF), has said that there is nothing wrong in taking a large contingent to the All Africa Games (AAG) in Mozambique.

The quadrennial Games will hold from Sept.3 to Sept.18 in Maputo.

Nwankpa told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Tuesday in Lagos that going with a large contingent would avail some athletes the opportunity to gain experience.

He also said that participating in only the sports where the country had comparative advantage was not a guarantee for success.

Nwankpa said that the Games could also be used to effect a succession plan where new talents would eventually replace the ageing ones.

He said that countries like the U.K. attended the Commonwealth Games and the Olympics with a large contingent not only to win medals but to expose future stars to the rigours of competition.

“Most of the stars you see excelling in the various sports today did not emerge as talents overnight but through constant participation in competitions.

“Their governments did not because of poor performance in previous outings trim the sports to feature at competitions they attended but they tried and tried until they succeeded.

“The National Sports Commission (NSC) should do likewise and regard money previously spent as investment and not to truncate the dream of athletes who did not perform well,” he said.

He lamented the slow pace of preparation by Team Nigeria for the games and complained about the lack of activity in the boxing camp.

He added that time was getting too short for adequate preparation of the boxing team for the games.

Obisia implored the NSC to spare no expense in preparing the country’s contingent adequately for the games and not use the lack of money as an excuse to delay preparation.

“What we need is early and proper preparation and not one done haphazardly.

“Our preparation should be done in a systematic manner and not at the last minute when we want to build our Rome in one day,” he said.
(NAN)