3rd July, 2013
Since he made his debut for Nigeria at the 2006 Commonwealth Games in Australia, Ejike Ugboaja has remained an important member of the country’s national basketball team, D’Tigers. The 6.9 feet guard who featured for the Utena Juventus Club in Lithuania last season had gone ahead to represent Nigeria at the 2007, 2009 and 2011 FIBA-Africa Championships (Afrobasket). He also played at the 2012 Summer Olympic Games held in London. Ahead of the 2013 Afrobasket, the 2006 NBA Draft by the Cleveland Cavaliers, in this interview with BAMIDELE OLOWOSAGBA, takes a look at Nigeria’s chances at the biennial tourney holding in Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire from 20-30 August.
In less than two months, the 2013 Afrobasket will begin in Cote d’Ivoire. What is your take on the preparation of the D’Tigers?
Well, I must confess I am not happy with everything about our preparation. And I realised the reason we never started in time was because of the indecision on who to lead the team to Abidjan. After our participation in the Olympics, the Head Coach, Ayo Bakare and captain, Olumide Oyedeji, said they’ve retired. Why are they coming back now? Personally, as one of the veterans of the team, I refused to be part of the team and I expect coach Bakare to call me and find out why. But due to the sentiment of the coach he never cared to know why I decided to opt out of the team. That shows he don’t care about me.
Why are you not part of the team currently in camp preparing for the Afrobasket in Abidjan?
I decided to opt out of the D’Tigers, like I said earlier, because of too much sentiments in the team. The D’Tigers’ team under Coach Bakare are being selected based on sentiments. Coach Bakare keeps you out of the team not because you are good enough to be in the team but because he has one thing against you. If you don’t play for his club in the domestic league he would not play you. He doesn’t even believe in the home based players. These are players that make the national team thick in the past. How does a coach who owns a team in the domestic league and never coached a team abroad wont believe in the players playing in the league? He always wants to play you because you are one of his players that play abroad or you are the one he could toss around. And that was one of the reasons so many of the lads that played at the Olympics decide not to be part of the next Afrobasket.
A lot of pundits believe coach Bakare still remain the most experienced Nigerian basketball coach, either home or abroad, that can handle the national team. Do you think there is any other Nigerian who could have replaced the current coach?
I don’t subscribe to those who believe coach Bakare is the best coach that could handle the national team. There are other better coaches in this country or abroad that would lead the D’Tigers to better successes. The likes of Ime Udoka of the San Anthonio Spurs in the USA, Coach Ogor Odaudu of Royal Hoopers Club of Port-Harcourt are very good coaches that can handle the national team. Udoka is currently the assistant coach of Spurs after a distinguished career as a player in the NBA. And coach Odaudu is the current back-to- back champions of the DSTV League and I don’t know what else they need to prove to handle the national team.
What do you think is stopping these coaches from getting the D’Tigers’ job?
It is because of some people in the NBBF who don’t like these coaches and are not ready to give them a chance to prove themselves. They would rather keep Coach Bakare who has never distinguished himself with a club outside Nigeria or won the league back-to-back. A lot of people think he was responsible for our qualification for the 2012 Olympics but those of us that played in the qualifiers in Venezuela know better. So many things happened during the qualifiers that really proved that Coach Bakare was ill equipped. But we the players decided to make history as the first set of players to qualify Nigeria for the basketball event in the Olympic Games. We were beaten by the USA in the Olympics by over 80 points because of Coach Bakare. Even our defeat in the hands of Angola at last year’s Afrobasket in Madagascar was because of Coach Bakare. How could you put a player to play a full match against Angola just because you like him? That won’t happen anywhere else. Al Farouk asked him a simple question about our defensive rotation in Venezuela and Coach Bakare could not answer it. But the NBBF decided to play politics with it. You don’t play politics with the passion of millions of Nigerians.
What do you think is responsible for the dearth of quality players in the domestic league.?
The major problem is the fact there are lot of people in charge of basketball in this country who don’t want to let go some positions because of their selfish interests. And instead of building the sport they are killing it. How can DSTV be doing a lot in terms of sponsorship and coverage of some league games on the satellite and we are not progressing? Our female team failed to qualify for the last Olympics because the same coach who handled the male team went to coach the female team. Does it mean we don’t have coaches in this country again?
With coach Bakare still in charge of the D’Tigers, do you see Nigeria winning the elusive Afrobasket title this time around?
Well, I hope the return of coach Bakare will not haunt the team in Abidjan because most of us that put our lives in line to qualify Nigeria for the 2012 Olympics are no more in the team. And this is because of the way Coach Bakare is running the team. A team that is being run like a personal affair will not excel. I hope the team that will represent the country would be strong enough to take on the likes of Angola, the defending champions, Tunisia, who almost upset us at the Olympics. I learnt the team are currently playing the Stankovic Cup in China. How could they take them to China where they still take us as professionals? I was in China with the D’Tigers before and going there was never a step forward but backwards. If we need to prepare better we need to participate in stronger competitions and invite more home based players to be part of the team.