The organisers of the Governor’s Cup Lagos Tennis Championship have explained their reason for giving wild card to players who got them in the 17th edition of the ITF pro-circuit.
Nigerian Tennis Live had exclusively reported that talented Nigerian youngsters; Christopher Bulus, Oyinlomo Quadri and Adetayo Adetunji were all handed wild cards to participate in the Futures that offers $25,000 as prize money.
And during a press briefing to officially announce the commencement of the tournament in Lagos, Prince Wale Oladunjoye, the Tournament Director, informed that the wild cards were given to the players at the prerogative of the organisers.
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| Adetayo reached the quarterfinals of the 2017 Commonwealth Games and was a winner of the junior ITF Circuit in Benin Republic a few weeks ago. |
According to him, many players from all over the world had phoned in to request the wild card to enable them participate in the main draws of the Futures 4 & 5, but were denied in spite of their rankings.
He noted during the briefing, that: “Wild cards are technically the prerogative of Nigerians and is one of the major advantages of hosting. There were many mails by people asking for wild cards from all over the world.
“Some saying they were top 200, 300 in the world, that they wanted to play the tournament but that they needed a wild card to participate, but we denied all of them.”
On the reasons for giving the youngsters who got the wild cards, the grassroots sports administrator said: “In the last few years, we have been having talented Nigerians get the wild cards and this has been according to their ranking and it’s a technical decision.
“Sarah Adegoke will also get one of the wild cards for the tournament as well as Angel who is just returning from a serious injury.
“Most of these players are quite talented and we want to expose them to top tennis actions as soon as possible, hence the decision to give them the slots that they rightly got to participate in the tournament.”
The Governor’s Cup Lagos Tennis Championship serves off on Monday, 9 October, inside the Lord Rumens Courts of the Lagos Lawn Tennis Club, Onikan.