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By Abiodun Adewale.
As the Nigeria Cricket Federation continues preparations for the National U-17 Cricket Championship for boys and girls, 29 states have expressed interest in the tournament, The PUNCH reports.
According to the information unit of the NCF, Abuja will host the North Central eliminations, Kebbi will host North West, Gombe for North East, Edo (South South), Oyo (South West), while the hosts of the South East zone is yet to be decided as at the time of filing this report.
The NCF has announced January 20 for the commencement of zonal eliminations at centres across the country for the tournament, which has been tagged the biggest youth event and grassroots tournament in Nigeria.
Obioma Ubah, Partner and Corporate Responsibility Leader at PwC Nigeria, the title sponsors of the championship, said this year’s edition is expected to be the biggest in the history of the event.
“The partnership we have with the Nigeria Cricket Federation has been very fruitful, and their engagement of the school-age children has been very phenomenal, which has resulted in the continual growth of the championship. This aligns with our societal purpose agenda of driving youth engagement and empowerment,” she said.
About 1,000 boys and girls took part in the zonal qualifiers and national finals of the 2022 edition of the event, while more entries are being processed ahead of the January 20 qualifiers, which the Organising Committee chairman, Tayo Sowole, affirmed.
“The 2023 PwC-NCF National U-17 National Cricket Championship will surely reset the standard of the event going forward. First is that the facilities for this year’s finals are far better than the previous editions. Secondly, there has been a lot of groundwork done in the last year across the regions, in terms of developmental works,” Sowole stated.
Sixteen-year-old Piety Lucky, who broke into the female national team following her performance at the second edition of the event, also had a distinguished outing with the national team last year; registering an immaculate half-a-century at the 2022 Kwibuka Tournament in Rwanda.
The finals of this year’s event have been fixed for February 8 to 12 at the Cricket Oval of the Moshood Abiola National Stadium, Abuja. The girls and boys events will run concurrently at the two ovals.
“The event has also left a history of balanced gender participation across board, with 47 per cent of the entries in 2022 being from female athletes. The Nigeria Cricket Federation has pushed the girl-child inclusion agenda in their development project, and it is evident in the entries,” Sowole added.
