NBBF Says D'Tigers Were Not Stranded In Niger, Blames Road Trips On Lack of Funds

NBBF Says D'Tigers Were Not Stranded In Niger, Blames Road Trips On Lack of Funds

By Admin

The Nigeria Basketball Federation has blamed lack of funds for D’Tigers road trip to the just-concluded AfroCan tournament in Mali, Sports Extra reports.

D’Tigers traveled by road to-and-fro to Mali for the tournament and were allegedly without accomodation on their arrival back in Sokoto on Saturday.

Reacting to the disturbing images of D’Tigers home-based team being abandoned by the NBBF, the board explained that it was due to how funds were released.

“We all did it when we played. Mali is not a very far distance by road. Some officials (NBBF Board Members) themselves have done it in the past when players flew to Ivory Coast for the last window of the World Cup qualifiers,” NBBF president Musa Ahmadu-Kida said in a media statement made available to Sports Extra.

“For us, it is not an issue per se, it is a way of calibrating to the means that we have right now and making sure that the home-based players were properly represented in Mali for the AfroCan.

“Even if there was a professional that was taken for AfroCan, he would have gone by road because that was what we could afford at the time to ensure our players participated.”

The International Representative on the NBBF board, Col Sam Ahmedu (retd), said the report of players stranded at the Niger border was an attempt to confuse Nigerians who were already dissatisfied with the team’s performance in Mali, where they lost all their four games.

“No one was stranded at the Nigerien border. The team got to the border late and by then the immigration service had already closed for the day.”

Ahmedu said before the trip, players were properly briefed about the arrangements put in place by the NBBF and they all agreed.”

He stressed that with Nigeria participating in four major international events (U16 Boys in Cape Verde, AfroCan, AfroBasket Women in Senegal and FIBA World Cup Men in China) within a short period, there was need to think outside the box.