Nigeria ‘ll Do Well In London Olympics, If..

Nigerian former long jumper, Yusuf Ali, tells 2muchsports.com why Nigeria has only won two gold medals  at the Olympics. Yusuf laid the blame on the door step of the sports administrators arguing that they have not really given Nigerian athletes good preparations.

What will you say is the reason that all Nigeria years in participating at the Olympic, the nation has only won two gold medals?
It has been lack of adequate preparation. I think we do not start on time and we always think one year, two years is enough for Olympic preparation, but to me I think it is not. Having been to three Olympic Games and to even win a medal is not as easy as people may think. All said and done, we have the athletes; we have the potential, but if you do not prepare you can never do well. Nigeria should learn to start preparation well ahead of time, if we can do that I bet you Nigeria will do well. If you look at those that won the medals like Chioma Ajunwa; four years before the Olympic Games she was doing very well, she was banned, came back, had a very good programme and she won the gold medal. The Dream Team, we all saw that the people in the Team were not small boys, they were doing very well, and they were playing well. That tells you the level of Olympics Games; it is not for small boys at all. But if we can prepare very well, I think Nigeria will be doing very well.

Well, against that backdrop, how do you view the importance of the meeting of the minister with federation presidents and secretaries talking about Nigeria’s performance at the next Olympic when it is just a few months away?
The meeting is a very good thing, and I think from the meeting we will now have our plans on how we are going to participate at the Games and if  they follow the game plan to the later, I think we will do well. To be honest, I am not saying that we are going to the Olympic to win ten gold medals, but from the track and field we can win about two gold medals and other medals.
The first three months, between now and February, is very crucial in the calendar of athletics. It is called the buildup period whereby all the general things are done.
If we miss that period then we are in trouble. If funds can be available, athletes are called to camp or be in their various states or with their various coaches and train between now and January and February, I think we are half way through. Most of the time, that is the missing link. I remember 1990 when I won the Commonwealth Games, the Games was in February and I was in the USA. I left USA to come and camp in Bauchi. It was the three months of training that gave me the gold medal. So you must really train and camp for this Olympic Games. Because we do not have sponsors for athletes, there are no competitions. But when you camp them where they are guaranteed three square meals, and they can train very well and replenish, then they will do well.

Do we have the athletes that we can point at and say they can win an Olympic Gold, just as you can say of Jamaica, USA, and several other countries?
I can name Nigerian Athletes that are gold medal potential. If you go back to Beijing, before Blessing left Nigeria I told people that Blessing will win a medal in long Jump, they thought I was joking, she won a Bronze medal. Blessing can win a medal at the Olympic Games. Damola can win a medal in the 100m, Blessing can also win a medal in the 100m, the relay men, can win medal at the Olympics, So, these are the people I think can win medals for the country at the Games. The high jumper, Amata, who is doing 1.95meters; 2meters could win you a medal at the Olympics.
There are the few other once we know that are not known per say, but they are good Athletes that can win medal at the Olympics. When Chioma Ajunwa won that Gold medal at the Olympic Games nobody thought Nigeria Chioma Ajunwa could win a gold medal at the Olympics. But we saw it and we knew that 6.90 in long jump will win you Olympic medal; 7meters will win you Olympic medals, and Blessing is capable of doing that. Damola and Blessing can run 10.9, and 10.8, and this will win you Olympic medals. But the problem is that, are you going to prepare them? That is the issue we are talking about now. The Jamaicans, fine Usain Bolt, the worst he will get is the gold medal. It was the same as in those days with Carl Lewis, when it comes to the big games, Lewis will win, but there are other medals that people don’t think we can win, like the 800meters. This guy from Briton won the 800meters when nobody thought he could win that gold medal. So, there are some medals that like that, that if you train well, you will win them.

One area we are lacking is in coaching, how will you react to the effort of the sports ministry to bring ex internationals to help the situation?
I do not believe that all ex international can be able to do the job. If you are an ex international and you do not better your life, you don’t do anything, you don’t go to coaching course, you don’t even come out to coach people, then you are not relevant at all. But ex internationals that have taken part, that have degree and can coach, why not. Because they know what it takes to take it to that level. It is better than having an ordinary coach. But what I subscribe to is that the sports commission should do the hiring of coaches for all the sports in the country. Aside from football, name me any other sports that the coaches are been employed by the sports commission. They should hire coaches; this will now take us to the grass root, to the secondary schools, to the universities through which people like us were discovered. That is the issue; we wait to the level when the people are thirty and thirty five, by then it is too late. Let’s hire coaches that can go back to the grass root and discover these athletes, out of a thousand athletes they can make five Olympians. Look at Jamaica, in eight years they have transformed their sports, all the ex international in America went back to Jamaica, Raymond Steward who is training Usain Bolt, all went back home. This is how it works, and you see how their sports has transformed. I think we should borrow a leaf from that; lets make mistake and learn from it. But the issue is that we have left school sports, we have left the grass root, we are only recycling the same athletes every year.