Sports Logistic Issues Forced Us To Postpone Rugby Independence 7s- Rugby Federation's Technical Director

The Nigerian Rugby Football Federation's technical director, Mr. Fasumuyi Olatunji has disclosed that the Independence 7s Rugby tournament was postponed due to the late withdrawal of the Western 7s and the UR 7s.

The tournament was scheduled to hold on the weekend of 23rd and 24th of October but it has now been postponed until some of the major invitees, who pulled out at the late hour comes back on board.

Olatunji further explained that the above reason forced the major sponsors of the event to hold off on their sponsorship, which gave birth to the maiden edition of the President's 7s which was won by Cowrie RFC of Lagos.
Cowrie defeated Merlin RFC of UK both in the opening and the closing fixtures to emerge the champions of the tourney.

"The independence 7s has been postponed due to some insurmountable logistic reasons, so the major highlights of the events which are the western 7s and the UR 7s are not coming, the sponsors have also decided to hold off until the independence 7s will come up."

"So, we decided to go ahead and have a tournament, so that at least they can all play, we tried to avoid a situation whereby they'll come around and they return to their destinations without playing and that's what gave birth to the president's 7s which was held at the onikan Stadium in Lagos."

"Well, that means there'll be more 7s tournament, before, we used to have the Lagos 7s and the independence 7s, now the president's 7s has been added to the existing championships which means more games for the players."

"We have a league running, there are two different leagues running in the north, the North Central and the North east, and also in the south, we have a in the South East, West and the South-South region."

"We also have the super cup where the champions from all the Rugby regions in Nigeria to determine who is crowned the country's best for the year, in December, the champions cup will hold in Lagos with Barewa from the northern region playing Cowrie from the South."

"Apart from all the tournaments I have mentioned before, there another one named 2ko 10 but one thing we are trying to achieve now is the awareness and that's why we are making efforts to make the game appealing so that people can come out and watch whenever there's a competition."

"Yeah, I think we have two grassroots program. One is biig and the other is just gearing up hoping to get more sponsors."

"We have the Get-Into-Rugby programe which is in schools. We also have the high tries, this is also in schools and has even developed into a junior league in schools but I still believe we have a lot of work to do to improve on the game in the country."

Tunji Rugby.png
 
Back
Top