By Ado Salisu, Kano
The leadership of the Nigeria School Sport Federation (NSSF), technical partners of the First Bank/Samuel Okwaraji Foundation (SOF) National Secondary Schools football championship have applauded the standard of the competition.
With state representatives already determined in all the Northern States and most of the Southern States, the foremost grassroots and school sport body is happy that the competition, through the processes put in place for this inaugural edition, is living up to expectations.
Secretary General of the NSSF, Dr. Oba Funsho Usman said the thorough and transparent systems put in place have ensured that the main objective of the competition, which is to discover football talents hidden in schools are met, eradicating to the barest cases of use of ineligible players and mercenaries.
“We know the things that mar brilliant grassroots initiatives of this nature and we have blocked all loopholes and dealt decisively with those negative practices this time around.
“The NSSF is thrilled with all that have been achieved in this First Bank/Samuel Okwaraji Foundation Competition. The main objective is to ensure that talents in secondary schools have a national platform to showcase themselves.
“The State representatives in all the Northern States(North East, North West and North Central) have emerged and the representatives in the South East and South South have also emerged while the South West will be concluding their finals this weekend.
“The State finals had to be staggered so that they can be properly organised and monitored. This is a national competition so there must be adherence to standards.
“This explains why as technical partners, we are happy with the high standards in place for this inaugural edition so that we can lay a solid foundation for future editions and most importantly provide the platform for the right participants with the right ages to be discovered,” Usman concluded.
The Memoir Cup, as the competition is also called, is held in memory of Nigeria’s fallen football legend Samuel Okwaraji who slumped and died on August 12, 1989 while on active service for Nigeria during a 1990 World Cup qualifiers against Angola in Lagos.
