President of Nigeria Cricket Federation (NCF), Uyi Akpata has stated that the Nigerian squad at the ongoing African T20 regional qualifier has struggled because of the current changes being effected on the team.
The Yellow-Greens lost the fourth of six games at the qualifiers on Thursday, despite holding promise prior to the event.
‘’The plan of our administration is to ensure that we compete with top African countries in the next two years and we need to harness our best talent and expose them to tough playing opportunities like this Rwandan experience,” Akpata said.
He said though the defeats were tough on the Yellow Greens, the newly assembled team that had majorly the 2020 U-19 World Cup playing squad is a good foundation for any solid team we intend to build in the future.
“After this experience, the NCF board would send some of our players to high-performance centres in top cricketing nations for several months to acquire a high level of coaching experience as well as engage in competitions with countries that are above us,” he added.
Akpata said positive lessons would be drawn from the players’ outing in Rwanda, especially against east African sides Tanzania, Uganda, and Kenya.
‘’Tournaments sometimes are not all about winning. Without making excuses for our losses, I would say in comparison to the opponents, our players were not really tested beyond the Tri-Series in Uganda and the Bi-lateral Series in Lagos before arriving in Rwanda,” the NCF president also said.
Meanwhile, 30 players were discovered at the recent National Youth Games in Ilorin and would be going into intensive camp working with Asanka Gurusinha, the national coach and high development manager, as part of the federation’s development plan.