Tobias Igwe, a renowned athletics coach, has called on the National Sports Commission (NSC), to organise refresher courses for grassroot coaches to keep them abreast with the current trends in the discipline.

Igwe told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lagos  at the weekend that the need was necessary for the coaches to master the art of grooming grassroots talents to fruition as he also decried the poor state of the sport at the grassroots, which he said, had stunted the growth of budding talents.

File photo: US’ Tianna Madison (L) and Nigeria’s Blessing Okagbare compete in the women’s 100m heats at the athletics event during the London 2012 Olympic Games on August 3, 2012 in London. AFP PHOTO

“The problem with our system is that we don’t nurture our talents accordingly. We just discover and leave them on their own and they end up not attaining their full potential.

Even some of the coaches that are supposed to groom the athletes lack the expertise to do the job.

They will require some form of training to enhance their knowledge. Refresher courses are needed for coaches to be better equipped in their bid to discover and nurture young talents,” Igwe said.

Igwe, fondly called ‘Toblow’ by admirers, stressed the need for schools to have their own in-house coaches; and commended the University of Port Harcourt for adopting such a step.

“We need to have coaches in our higher institutions, in fact in all schools from primary to secondary.

Take for instance the University of Port Harcourt, they now have an in-house coach and things are beginning to look good and you will see them dominating very soon,”the coach added.

He urged the NSC to adopt the long-term preparatory approach to competitions like the Commonwealth and Olympic Games.

“The NSC needs to understand that three months camping cannot produce the result we want. For instance, which of the top 10 countries on the medals table in the Olympics trained for three months?

It’s only in Nigeria that people expect such miracle which is not possible. God does not encourage mediocrity,” Igwe said.