Mobil Track and Field starts on a poor note

Amidst speculations that this year’s Mobil track and Field Championship would not hold, it eventually took off late yesterday morning on a very poor note at the Abuja National Stadium. Nigeriasports.com can reveal.

Though both the home-based and their foreign based counterparts were on parade, the usual bubbling activities that hitherto herald the championship was conspicuously missing.

The entire stadium Complex was like a ghost land except that the few athletes and officials and some of the workers there were seen doing their things.

The event that was hitherto scheduled to start at 8am was held on till 10.30am; a development that resulted in some of the events being pushed forward to Friday.

The women’s 400 metres Hurdles, which was earlier scheduled to hold at 10.15 am was one of those affected.

It was learnt that poor entry (only eight entries) was the cause of shifting the event till tomorrow when it would be decided at once.

The usual preparation of the events’ result was not available as the Athletic Federation of Nigeria officials told nigeriasports.com that there were no materials to produce the results as the events were concluded.

However all the events concluded since morning was not printed out owing to what the officials said was as a result of no papers.

Following this development, reporters were made to go round the stadium Complex to the information room for the needed results. Even when it is available, one has to copy by hand after speaking much ‘Grammar’ with the officials in charge of the results.

Report by Fidelis Ebu in Abuja