As Nigeria’s sports lovers try to overcome the shock of seeing their very promising national team, D’Tigers, crumble 75-91 to Senegal at this year’s African Men’s Senior Basketball Championship in Luanda, Angola, a former member of the squad, Olumide Oyedeji, has disclosed that the opponents have bigger players and longer reach.
Sports247 gathered that Wednesday’s game at Pavilhao Multiusos de Luanda turned out to be an anti-climax, as the heroic surge of Mohammed Abdulrahman’s squad came tumbling like a pack of cards.
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The team that showed great promise with huge wins over champions of the last editiion, Tunisia, and big Eastern rival neighbours, Cameroon failed to recover after falling behind in the second quarter.
The analysis put forward by many observers was that the Senegalese, who have five AfroBasket titles to their name, took advantage of their physical endowments, compared to the smaller Nigerians.
Oyedeji, who was part of the Nigerian squad of 2015 that won the country’s only AfroBasket title to date, noted matter-of-factly: “They are actually bigger and with longer reach. They have the size, we have the quickness and ability to score at any given time, but they run on fast breaks.”
Sports247 reports that Wednesday’s defeat means Nigeria will not be able to feature at the next FIBA World Basketball Championship.
Apart from failing to get a second title in the competition, D’Tigers can no longer add to their four silver medals (1997, 1999, 2003, 2017) and three third-place feats (1995, 2005, 2011).
