The three-day sporting programme of the South East Zonal Elimination which serves as a prelude to the 2020 National Sports Festival (NSF) has come to a crescendo with TEAM ANAMBRA Male and Female sides qualifying for all the events it entered for save for two singles event.
The regional elimination series which serves as a qualifier for the upcoming 20th National Sports Festival (NSF), saw the Tony Oli’s led Anambra State Sports Development Commission (ASSDC), with the approval of His Excellency Chief Willie Obiano for the over 170-member contingent made up of athletes and officials to be part of the event at the Dan Anyiam Stadium, Owerri Imo State as the makeshift host gave a good account in terms of facilities and hospitality with the initial host Ebonyi State pulling out at the 11th hour.
It is expected that TEAM ANAMBRA athletes numbering over 300 with its team officials will embark on a three weeks camping and intensive training programme from the second week in the month of February to the second week in March 2020 for the main event coming up from the 23rd of March to the 1st of April 2020 in Benin, Capital of Edo State
To get to this stage, TEAM ANAMBRA coasted through in six of the sporting events it entered for at the Zonal Elimination save for Volleyball Female and Male Football with the breakdown as follows:
VOLLEYBALL:
Matches played in round robin format. The Anambra Male side saw off their Abia Counterparts by 2 sets to one (25-9, 25-27, 25-16), while seeing off Ebonyi by 3 sets to nil (25-19, 25-18, 25-19), they however lost to the host Imo by 2 sets to one to finish second in the group and picking one of the tickets to the 2020 NSF. The Female side were not so lucky as they lost to Ebonyi and Imo but however defeated Abia by 3 sets to nil (25-15, 25-16, 25-14).
BEACH VOLLEYBALL:
The Anambra Male and Female teams will have full representation in Benin at the 2020 NSF.
HANDBALL:
Team Anambra male and female sides finished second in their respective groups to book their places at the national sports piece coming up in March 2020.
BASKETBALL:
The male side booked their place at the 2020 NSF defeating Team Abia (39-24) and Ebonyi Team (42-21) losing to Imo with some controversial officiating.
CRICKET:
Both Male and Female Teams shows that they were a force to reckon with as they got through in their events for a spot in the cricket event of the upcoming 2020 NSF.
FOOTBALL:
The climax of it all was the football event at the Old Owerri Township Stadium as the female team showed resilence, poise and immense determination forcing their Imo counterpart to a scored draw (1-1) with the last kick of the ball before the final whistle hitherto recording a win against Abia (1-0) and a scoreless affair against Ebonyi. The male soccer team where not so lucky as they drew their first two matches against Abia (1-1) and Ebonyi (0-0) but couldn’t get the better of the host state losing by a slender 1-0 scoreline.
With the zonal elimination now concluded, TEAM ANAMBRA are expected to storm Edo State for the 20th National Sports Festival and will be featuring in over 17 events ranging from team sports, combat sports, board games and Track/field events.
