Ndanusa: Nigeria will post best ever result at London Olympics

He however noted that with the exclusion of wrestling and weightlifting from the sports to be competed for, the country’s quest for more medals will be punctured. “Without wrestling and weightlifting we are in a very tight position, it is a big challenge but with the support and hard work of the athletes that are […]

He however noted that with the exclusion of wrestling and weightlifting from the sports to be competed for, the country’s quest for more medals will be punctured.

“Without wrestling and weightlifting we are in a very tight position, it is a big challenge but with the support and hard work of the athletes that are in camp now, I believe we will surmount it.

“Preparation has been on for the All Africa Games, but the games not totally of Olympic stage, most of the things we do are mostly being handled by the National Sports Commission, and they are doing very well.

“On the part of the NOC, we are supervising and making sure that the athletes are in camp and all the logistics needed are provided; so I want to assure you that as far as the NOC is concerned everything will be done right”, he stated.

One of the practical ways of ensuring that Nigeria achieves her dream, Ndanusa says athletes with the prospect of hauling medals have been granted scholarship by the NOC to shore up their skills ahead of the global sports show next year.

“We are not going to London to watch the new stadium, if in the past we had been participating, this time we are going there to compete, and that means we are going for medals, especially gold medals and the preparations age in earnest.

“From our Olympics point of view, we look at the performance of our athletes at the Commonwealth Games, which was really impressive. Out of the 10 athletes that posted good performance at the games there, we have picked some and gave them scholarship in such a way that each of them will be given $4, 000 per quarter up the time of the games. So that is confirmed and we are monitoring their training both locally and internationally, and that is just to add to what the government is doing.

“Also to make sure that at London 2012 we haul a lot of medals, we have acquired a training camp about 30 minutes away from the main stadium and 30 minutes away from the Games Village and the facilities there are almost equivalent to what we have at the venue of the competition.

“So, we are going to use the same facilities for training and the same for the competition proper. We are also taking advantage of the facilities at the camp site for the control of doping.

“So as soon as the athletes get into the camp for training, we test them, and when they finish training we test them before they get into the games proper, and again the community where we are going to stay are coming to receive us and we have signed an MoU with them”, he concluded.