NGF celebrates Nigeria’s qualification for Youth Olympics’ golf event

Officials of the Nigerian Golf Federation (NGF) has been in joyous mood since the announcement that the country has been granted the right to field players at the Buenos Aires 2018 Youth Olympics scheduled to run from October 6 to 18 in the Argentine city.

This will be Nigeria’s first entry into the golf event of the Youth Games, which Buenos Aires 2018 is the third edition and to ensure that the country put up a credible performance at the games, the NGF has started a series of events to put its players in the right shape.

Speaking on the country’s invitation to participate in the event, NGF’s Youth Development Officer, Emy Ekong said the development is the fall out of concerted efforts by the federation and the Nigeria Olympics Committee (NOC), adding that the federation would ensure that the country performs well at the event.

She revealed that the world golf governing body allocated only two slots to Nigeria, saying that a good outing in Argentina would force the body to increase the slots.

“I think the development is not unconnected with the latest performances of Georgia Oboh, Anita Uwadiae and Tokunbo Pedro, among others in recent competitions.  Despite the efforts of these players, we got only two slots because we are still lowly rated in world rankings.

“Unfortunately for us, Anita and Tokunbo cannot feature in the games because they are now above the stipulated age limit, but we have quality players that can hold their own against the best juniors in the world.”

It is certain that Georgia Oboh will take one of the slots, but Ekong said the NGF will organize “a series of events locally and attend international events to be able to pick the best out of the many budding stars available to us.”

She added: “The NOC has been of tremendous help to us. In fact, Mr. Tunde Popoola was at the vanguard of the fight to ensure that we got the opportunity to play in Argentina following our exploits at the last African Youth Games.

“The challenge now is to find the required funds to prepare adequately for the games because this is not something we can toy with. It will feature the best young stars from across the world and some of these players have been exposed to the best facilities in the world. So for our players to compete successfully against them, we must equip them very well.”