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Nigeria’s top-ranked squash players in the men’s and women’s category, Adegoke Onaopemipo and Rofiat Abdulaziz are some of the players billed to compete at the maiden edition of the Yellow Dot Squash tourney which will serve off on Tuesday, PUNCH Sports Extra reports.
The maiden edition will see over 160 players across the country take part at the event billed to hold at the Squash Hall of the Teslim Balogun stadium, Lagos from March 5 to 9.
The four days event is aimed at ensuring that the country get qualified players that will challenge for a place at the 2028 Olympics when squash will feature in the global sporting event.
Disclosing this to the media in a press conference to herald the championship which will be open for both senior and juniors, chairman of Yellow Dots Recreation and Sports club, organisers of the tournament, Prince Sola Adekunle explained that the winners of both male and female categories will win N800,000 while the runners-up will go home with N500,000.
Giving a break down of the prizes, he stated that the second and third runners- up will get N250,000 each; quarter- finalists will receive N120,000 with those that qualified for round of 16 and 32 getting 40,000 and N25,000 respectively.
Winner of the U-16 boys will pocket N30,000 with the first runners-up getting N20,000 while the third and fourth best players will get N10,000 respectively.
In the girls U-16, the winner will go home with N25,000, the first runners-up gets N15,000 with the third and fourth placed players getting N10,000 each.
The juniors will go home with gifts items such as rackets, bags, shoes etc
According to him, they decided to offer such huge prize money in order to promote the racket game and make it attractive to many top players from various states of the country.
“This is the first time in the history of squash that such a huge prize money is being offered and because we believe in gender equality, decided that there shall be no disparity between men and women players.
“Our aim is to promote the game and make people see the beauty of the sports,” Adekunle said.
“Yellow Dot is a fairly young sports club and that’s why we decided to have the best standard in the championship.”
Adekunle also commended Lagos State Government and management of Teslim Balogun Stadium for their support since the club started using the facility in 2018 just as he called on corporate organisations to support the club in developing the game of squash.
In his remarks, chairman of the rrganising committee of the tournament, Femi Bankole explained that the tournament will allow local players gain maximum points to be ranked by the Professional Squash Association.