Captain of Lagos Islanders Basketball club, Seun Akinwale has once again congratulated the duo of Kano Pillars Basketball and Mark Mentors Basketball Club of Abuja for emerging Winners and runner up respectively at the recently concluded DSTV/NBBF Men Premier Basketball League, while tiping them to surpass expectations declaring that “both are good as African Champion”.
Speaking ahead of the club’s Africa Men Club championship campaign in faraway Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso between October 20th and 29th, the influential captain said, “first, I want to congratulate them, because they are ours and they have proven to be the best 2 in the country.
Akinwale whose game time was hampered by a freak accident that kept him out of contention for about 3 months believes that with the new FIBA rule barring clubs from signing players from a rival local club is a welcome development as this will brighten the chances of Nigerian teams competing for honors.
“FIBA Africa says you cannot get a player from another club in the same country to compete for the continental assignment”
“I think that getting a player from another club usually breaks the team chemistry because the player is going to come in a short time, maybe in 2 weeks or in a month, bring his own team’s philosophy and playing pattern which may break the team chemistry.
”Akinwale who has already started an individual pre-season training at the National stadium, Lagos, ahead of 2014 basketball league season, bemoaned the poor showing of Nigerian representatives at the continental stage despite an impressive domestic record and tracing the recent bad results recorded to poaching of players from rival clubs rather than prosecuting the competition with players that earned the continental qualification.
“But I think that now, if a team is been there for a whole season, they have been together, I think they will be stronger and understand each other better to interprete their plays.”He praised the two teams for sweeping all other oppositions aside to emerge as representatives of the “Giant of Africa” at the qualifier stage.
“Going by current record, Mark Mentors and Kano Pillars are the best 2 basketball teams in Nigeria and Nigeria has one of the best leagues in Africa and it’s also challenging playing in the Nigeria league.”
“I think they will do well this time around”
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