Basketball players, fans and enthusiasts in Nigeria can now enjoy top African basketball games and sporting actions for free on Awatv, Nigeria’s free digital channel (Channel 749).

This is as the Basketball Africa League will hold its historic inaugural season between May 16-30 in Rwanda, and some key 12 matches will show live on Awatv.

In a media chat in Lagos, Bayo Adebiyi, CEO of Telly4 Africa, owners of Awatv said: “The Basketball Africa League (BAL) has announced that the league’s inaugural season will tip off Sunday, May 16 at the Kigali Arena in Kigali, Rwanda, with 12 teams from across Africa competing in the new professional league and we are thrilled that Awatv would air all the live games exclusively for our viewers.

The 12 club teams competing are from 12 African countries, including Algeria, Nigeria, Angola, Cameroon, Egypt, Madagascar, Mali, Morocco, Mozambique, Rwanda, Senegal and Tunisia. The BAL will kick off with Rivers Hoopers of Nigeria versus Patriots of Rwanda.”

Adebiyi stated further : “Viewers in Nigeria will be able to watch key 12 matches live on Awatv which is on National Digital Free View Platform showing in Lagos, Plateau, Abuja, Kaduna, Enugu, Kwara and Osun State. The pre-event countdown show titled Road to BAL took running from 9th to 15th May, by 6:30 to 7pm and during the pre-event, a ten-minute segment would allow viewers to call in, predict and win fabulous prizes.

“The live tournament which will be take-off on 16 May will be anchored and co-hosted by Deji Omotoyinbo who has presented Sports Shows on Radio and TV for a wide range of Corporate Sponsors for over 25 years.

“Others are Bode Oguntuyi who has also covered many NBA Finals and All-Star Games as an accredited reporter and was a Basketball Columnist for ESPN; Oluwafemi Adefeso a Sports On Air Personality (OAP), social entrepreneur (B.A.L.L Africa) and the convener of the African Basketball Conversation, and Queen Moseph, the only female media officer in the Nigeria Men’s Basketball League with Rivers Hoopers Basketball Club. Viewers are guaranteed excitement, fun and a lot of dunking throughout the competition on Awatv free digital view platform channel 749.”

Awatv is a National free view entertainment channel targeted at contemporary women, young adults and kids. It broadcasts nationwide on National Digital terrestrial platform.

The BAL, a partnership between the International Basketball Federation (FIBA) and the National Basketball Association (NBA), builds on the foundation of club competitions FIBA Regional Office Africa has organized on the continent and marks the NBA’s first collaboration to operate a league outside of North America. The first BAL Finals will be held Sunday, May 30.

Former Super Eagles goalkeeper Peter Rufai believes the team’s current goalkeepers will be vital in the team’s mission to win next year’s Africa Cup of Nations.

With Maduka Okoye, who played a crucial role in the team’s qualification for the tournament, assured of his number one position and others like Francis Uzoho and Daniel Akpeyi, the Super Eagles are not short of options in the goalkeeping position.

Rufai, a member of the Super Eagles side that won the 1994 AFCON in Tunisia, told Soccernet.ng in a chat that the same attention placed on the strikers should be put on the goalkeepers.

“I really don’t know why so much noise has made on the Super Eagles strikers banging in the goals in Europe for their respective clubs without attention been focused on the goalkeeping department,” he said.

“If the strikers are banging the goals for the Super Eagles in a competition, and our goalkeepers failed to keep a clean sheet, of what benefit will that be for the team.

“Yes, we have Maduka Okoye, Francis Uzoho, and a few to mention. However, are they are on the same level in terms of performance with our strikers?

“They are good goalkeepers, but we need to pay attention to them so that we can get the best from them,” he concluded.

Onuachu is special, incomparable – Former Belgian coach talks up Super Eagles star’s Premier League.

Former Belgium national team coach René Vandereycken has revealed his admiration for Nigerian striker Paul Onuachu, who has kept tongues singing his praises following an astonishing goal-scoring campaign for Racing Genk.

Onuachu has racked up an incredible 31 goals and three assists in 35 league matches for Genk to power the Smurfs to a top-four finish. The ex-Midtjylland man equally found the back of the net twice in three games to help Racing triumph in the Belgian Cup.

With a scoring record that places him among the best strikers in Europe, Onuachu attracts interest from Italy, France, and Scotland.

Vandereycken is convinced that Onuachu is ready to step up from the Belgian championship to the German Bundesliga or even the English Premier League.

Talking up the physical attributes and footballing intelligence of Onuachu, the former Genk manager expects the Super Eagles man to cope well with moving to a more demanding league.

“Onuachu is a very special type of striker; you can hardly compare him with anyone,” Vandereycken told Het Nieuwsblad via VoetbalPrimeur. “Despite his 2.01 meters, Onuachu is technically strong and fast. And he often succeeds in making the right decision has to do.”

Football fans on GOtv Max and Jolli packages will watch the FA Cup final, which will see Chelsea and Leicester meet at the iconic Wembley Stadium in London tomorrow.

This match will air live on SuperSport Football (GOtv Channel 31) from 5:15pm.

Customers will get to watch their favourite players play such as Mason Mount from Chelsea and Kelechi Iheanacho from Leicester City. Chelsea and Leicester have met in 118 matches across all competitions since the first clash back in 1905. The Blues have claimed 57 wins compared to 27 for the Foxes, while 34 games have been drawn.

Speaking on this, Chief Customer Officer, Martin Mabutho said: “The FA Cup is the world’s oldest knockout football competition and we are glad to bring the live action from the final match to our GOtv Max and Jolli customers at no extra cost.”

Chelsea, eight-time winners of the FA Cup (most recently in 2018), will come into this clash with both the historical pedigree and the status as favourites, given the excellence they have shown across all competitions under manager, Thomas Tuchel.

Leicester, meanwhile, have reached the FA Cup final for the first time in more than half a century and will be hoping to win the competition for the first time ever.

By Morakinyo Abodunrin

Unless there is a volte-face, the widely speculated friendly match between the Super Eagles and Teranga Lions of Senegal during next month’s FIFA International window, will not see the light of the day.

Top officials  of the Nigeria Football Federation(NFF) have been looking at the possibility  of securing some high profile friendlies  with African teams for the Super Eagles after the Confederation of African Football  (CAF) postponed  the start of the Qatar 2022 World Cup qualifiers  from June to September.

The Super Eagles were to begin their long campaign towards a place in the first FIFA World Cup to be hosted in the Middle East with a home match against the Lone Stars of Liberia on the weekend of June 5 to 8 while they travel away to Cape Verde on  the weekend of June 11 to 14.

Words were rife that  the NFF had  secured  two important games with Cameroon  and Senegal with further possibility of adding another country in what would have  been a four-nation  festival  to be held in Austria.

Our  correspondent gathered  that the Fédération Sénégalaise de Football (FSF) have since backed out of the arrangement despite holding talks with the NFF.

“ It is true  that officials of both the  NFF and FSF held talks about a friendly match in June but  in the end, Senegal will not  play Nigeria,” a reliable source in Dakar told NationSport.

It would be recalled that  both  West African sides had clashed twice in friendlies  in recent times since coach Gernot Rohr took over the reins of the Super Eagles in 2016. Apart from the  1-1 draw recorded in 2017 in London, the Teranga Lions beat the Super Eagles 1-0  in a pre-2019 AFCON friendly match in Ismailia but a third friendly clash might not be coming too soon.

But German coach Rohr is upbeat  that  Super Eagles would play two key friendlies in June in order to keep his wards in tip-top shape.

“ We will do two friendlies on the 4th and 9th of June,” assured the 67-year-old German without a recourse to the likely opponents.

“ There will be strong African teams and the NFF will communicate (on the likely opponents).”

Chairman, Caretaker Committee of the Nigeria Wrestling Federation (NWF) Hon. Daniel Igali is hopeful Team Nigeria wrestlers will get the right kind of preparations that ‘would get them over the hurdle’ at the Tokyo 2020 Games in Japan, as the athletes commenced camping for the global multi-sport fiesta.

Five wrestlers, including Commonwealth champions Odunayo Adekuoroye (57kg), Aminat Adeniyi (62kg) and Blessing Oborodudu (68kg), on Tuesday began camping for the Summer Games in Yenagoa, the Bayelsa State capital. The trio are joined by youngster Adidjat Idris (50kg) and Ekerekeme Agiomor (86kg), who would be making their Olympic debuts in Japan.

While in Yenagoa, the Tokyo-bound wrestlers will be perfecting strategies under the watch of coaches Purity Akuh, Victor Kodei and Happiness Burutu in a bid to win Nigeria’s first wrestling medals at the Olympics.

In addition to staging a ‘test competition’ for the athletes in Yenagoa, Igali also disclosed that the wrestlers are billed to participate in a Ranking Series tournament in Poland (in June) as part of their preparations for the Tokyo 2020 Games.

“This is the preparation we hope would get them over the hurdle at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics,” Igali, who won Olympic gold for Canada at the Sydney Games in 2000, said. “They would be here (Yenagoa) right up until early August, when they leave for another preparatory camp in Tokyo.

“Our plan is to, for the next couple of weeks, get them efficiently prepared to go to a Ranking Series competition in Poland. We also plan to have a competition here in Bayelsa – a test competition for them.

“We have about three training partners to each athlete because we want to mimic a situation where they have different kinds of opponents, so that all five qualified athletes are given the necessary preparations.”

The delayed-Tokyo Games will take place from 23 July to 7 August, with wrestling running from 1 – 7 August.

Though UEFA is yet to confirm the venue for the Champions League final – but Portugal is increasingly seen as the favoured option.

Wembley has been given every chance to stage the all-English showdown between Chelsea and Manchester City, but talks on Monday and Tuesday saw the Government fail to offer quarantine exemptions for around 2000 media and guests.

Liverpool boss Jurgen Klopp has called Pep Guardiola the best manager in the world as he congratulated Manchester City on an “exceptional” title success.

Manchester United’s 2-1 defeat to Leicester on Tuesday night confirmed Guardiola’s third Premier League title and City’s fifth in the last decade as they succeeded Liverpool as champions.

Guardiola called it the “hardest” of his successes given the difficult circumstances of the pandemic, and a poor start to the season which left City eighth on Christmas Day, and Klopp agreed as he said their achievement stood out.

“A great achievement, congratulations,” Klopp said. “I texted Pep last night and Ilkay (Gundogan, a player Klopp managed at Borussia Dortmund).

“It was a very difficult year for the whole world, for football teams as well, and what they achieved so far this year is exceptional.”

He added: “Five titles in 10 years – it’s always like this when you bring together financial resources and football knowledge, you have a good chance to create something special and that is obviously the case.

“City has an incredible squad and the best manager in the world so that makes it a good recipe.”

It is a ninth European league title as a manager for Guardiola, who won three LaLiga crowns with Barcelona and the Bundesliga three times with Bayern Munich.

The Catalan has described the Premier League the most difficult of the leagues to win, a verdict backed by Everton boss Carlo Ancelotti – a title winner with Chelsea 11 years ago – as he added his own congratulations.

Tyson Fury and Anthony Joshua will clash in Saudi Arabia on August 14 – assuming Fury is happy with his contract. Fury had cast doubt over the fight taking place at all earlier this week when his promoter Frank Warren revealed he was unhappy with the terms of the deal. That forced Joshua to speak out and demand a resolution – and although negotiations are continuing, Warren is now confident an agreement will be reached.

He told talkSPORT: “It definitely won’t be on August 7 because that’s when the Olympic games are on and that’s gonna be a problem for TV. “Besides that, you’ve got a UFC PPV in the States and UK so if it goes on, it’ll be on August 14.”