The leadership of the Nigeria Tennis Federation (NTF) has been encouraged to ensure that each of the 36 tennis associations in Nigeria organizes a minimum of one tournament to go round all the states of the federation.
This advice was given by Germany-based Nigerian tennis coach, Lakon Adeniran, who noted that the prospects of having another ITF Futures in Nigeria was not a bad idea, but wants the locals to also have something they can always look forward to locally.
The suggestion by the Germany-based star is similar to that of Coach Abel Ubiebi, who noted that if there was a local tournament every week, Nigerian tennis players would be better prepared for any ITF Futures that the NTF may be providing for the local stars.
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| Lakon Adeniran during a training session with some of his kids in his Germany base. |
Lakon who made his mind known from his base in Kaiserslautern, Germany, explained that it may be difficult for the Nigerian players to play in the Futures because of the stiff competition, but they can frequently participate in the national championships if there are many of them.
He said: “We appreciate international tournament in Nigeria. But the questions are these: how many home based players can afford to play those tours?
“Can all top 15 in the nation be able to play all legs? Without local tournaments to prepare for international tour, none of the Nigerian tennis players will make it to semi or final stage.
“I think the new administration should build grassroots tournaments for junior and senior players, then they can think of adding international tours to the yearly calendar.
“Nothing is bad if the 36 states we have in Nigeria host tournaments, that way, we can have about 3 local tournaments in a month.”
The NTF after its Annual General Meeting on Saturday, 18 November, would have taken some of these suggestions into consideration ahead of the release of a communique.