Sports
Taekwondo Association Plans Talent Hunt
The FCT Taekwondo Association is set to revive the declining fortunes of the sport through a talent hunt programme.
It wants to achieve this by organising taekwondo championships, said Mr Benjamin Eneh, the Chairman of the association.
The second FCT kiddies Taekwondo Championship organised by the FCT Taekwondo Black Belt College which took place in Abuja recently, was part of the moves being made by the body to actualise its objective.
Eneh, who made this known to the press on Saturday in Abuja, said that the championship was purely a grassroots initiative to discover budding talents.
“We brought these kids together because our aim is to improve the profile of the sport from the grassroots.
“We want to groom these children right from the scratch, so that in a few years from now we will be churning out potential champions in taekwondo,’’ he said.
Eneh added that apart from physical development of the body, “taekwondo is also capable of aiding the concentration level of kids in their academic work in school.
“It’s a sport that could bring children in harmony with their minds and their body by way of training them to learn how to concentrate.
“And even in their academics, most of them who have not been doing well, stand the chance of improving on their school work by joining the taekwondo club.’’
He said that the key elements of taekwondo were modesty, humility, self-control and perseverance-virtues that he said could build a man into a noble character.
Meanwhile, the Head of Technical FCT Sports Department, Mr Tony Anafulu, said that the purpose of the championship was to discover the best among the children and build them up for the professional phase.
He added that a professional training would be organised for the outstanding talents that were discovered from the programme, to further enhance their capability.
Thirteen schools, including some residents’ association taekwondo clubs in the FCT, featured in the programme.
All registered kids are to be given certificates and medals in the different categories of the discipline.
England captain Harry Kane netted a hat-trick to guide Bayern Munich to an impressive victory against Stuttgart.
Kane’s goals, plus one from Kingsley Coman, helped Bayern end a three-game winless run in all competitions.
They faced a tough task against a Stuttgart side who sat back and limited their chances, leading Vincent Kompany’s side to enter the break frustrated and with the deadlock unbroken.
Bayern eventually found a way past Stuttgart’s steely defence when Kane drilled a low effort into the bottom corner from around 30 yards out after Joshua Kimmich overturned possession.
Former Nigeria goalkeeper, Dosu Joseph, is full of thanks to God after he miraculously survived another life-threatening automobile accident recent at Kara, along the Lagos-Ibadan Express Way, where a heavy-duty truck ran into his SUV.
Narrating his ordeal, the 51-year-old, who guided Nigeria to gold in the Men’s Football Tournament of the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta, broke the news in a statement on his social media handles on Friday.
“To God be the glory, another death escaped by Grace and Mercy of God. Me and my friend SM were at Enyo Filling Station after Ojodu Berger bus stop to get fuel on Wednesday, October 2, 2024, around 6 p.m. when this MACK truck fully loaded with iron, with registration number LND 470 XX, left the road and crushed my car beyond repairs. Thank God for life,” he stated.
This is the second time the soft-spoken club proprietor will cheat death by a whisker, having been involved in an accident in 1997 that ended his career at 23 and left his spinal cord in bad shape.
He helped Julius Berger win the Nigeria FA Cup in November 1997 shortly a memorable Olympic outing by keeping a clean sheet in the finals against Katsina United. The following year, he was involved in the auto along Ikorodu Road, Lagos, which not only cut his career short but also left him almost paralysed, ending his spell at Serie A club Reggiana.
The former Nigeria international, who also kept goal for Julius Berger FC, said the case has been reported to Isheri Police Station, Ogun State, where the driver is currently detained and the truck also seized.
According to him, the owner of the truck said he can’t fix the badly damaged SUV until after a year.
Ex – Super Eagles of Nigeria, Okwuchukwu Waobikeze has observed that sports development in Nigeria is going down.
According to him, grassroots sports is very important, without it, the administrators cannot get it right. So everybody should key into grassroots sports development, he said.
Waobikeze said this last Wednesday in an interview with sports journalists shortly after the Port Harcourt All Stars Independence football festival (OCTOBERFEST) at the Port Harcourt club, Rivers State.
He explained that for sports administrators to get it right, grassroots development is key. “They should be organising competition at the grassroots level to fish out the young ones for different sporting activities.
“Grassroots sports is very important so the administrators have to go back to the grassroots.
” Sports Development in Nigeria is going down we need to go back to the basics.
“Look at the just concluded Paris Olympics, Nigeria did not win any medal.
” Our football team did not even qualify for the Olympics. We are going down.
” If they should go back to the grassroots, they will get young ones in the games and talents will be developed.
” I started from school games, to youth games before playing for the national team. Now everybody wants to fly board to play professional football and a lot do not know the basics of the game.
” A lot of people did not know the little things about the game, they just want to play. It is not done so,” Waobikeze stated.
Kiadum Edookor
