Orgainsers of the annual NCC Tennis League have told participating teams in this season’s competition that it will not be business as usual.
The NCC League has been one of tournaments Nigerian tennis players have been most grateful for since the turn of 2015, because apart from the prizes they have won in the course of the league, it has also helped with match fitness when there were no national tournaments in the country.
And the organisers have rightly informed that the participants this year should know they may not have things as rosy as the first three editions.
 |
| Joseph Imeh was adjudged the most outstanding player of the entire League season for the 2017 edition. |
In an exclusive interview with Nigerian Tennis Live, Godwin Kienka, the Director of the International Tennis Academy, organisers of the League, rightly informed that the participating teams may have to go through a playoff series to determine those who will participate in the competition.
This, he says, is because so many corporate bodies, individuals are showing interests in sponsoring teams to participate and it may be an overflow from the previous plan and number of teams to participate.
“This season’s League is likely to kick off end of May, most likely. People are getting more interested and new teams are coming up.
“Right now, I can confirm that people are strategizing on how to win the league this year, which makes the whole drama more interesting. We are also working on having a bigger tournament having done this for the past three years already,” Kienka, a former tennis umpire, explained.
According to him: “We may have to do play offs to find the best teams to make up the teams that we need for the entire league season because we have a lot teams jostling to be part of the project this year.
Team Tombim, Team Offikwu and Team Civil Defence have won the first, second and third editions respectively and Civil Defence who were unbeatable last season, will want to defend their title when hostilities kick off in Lagos.