Former junior athlete, Goodness Thomas has lamented the seeming neglect of local talents in preference of foreign-based athletes by the Athletics Federation of Nigeria.

Thomas, a distinguished junior athlete ,made the team to the Commonwealth Games and the African Championships based on her fifth-placed finish at the trials in Calabar, but was dropped by the AFN.

At the Comonwealth Games, Loretta Ozoh who did not participate in the trials in Calabar due to the fact that her drug suspension was yet to expired, was drafted in the place of Thomas. Even at that, the athlete who was sixth, Dominic Duncan, an American, was featured at the Games

“I do not know what I have done to be ignored. I made the Commonwealth standard and all of us that came fourth, fifth and sixth in the trials ran almost the same 11.65. I cannot understand why I was dropped from the Commonwealth and the African championships.

“As a growing athlete, I have been representing this country in junior meets. Missing the Commonwealth and the African Championships is very painful to me ,” said the athlete.

However, Thomas remarked that she was not perturbed by the development, rather for her it was a challenge to train hard next season.

“I see this as challenge. What it means for me to train harder and I am ready to do so.

“I can only wish that those at the AFN will encourage us and have more faith in us here at home.”