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Ahead of this year’s Sports festival, the Ondo State Government has said Team Ondo is out to up the ante of showing what the state is made off with a target to win more gold medals during the festival.
The General Manager, Ondo State Sports Council, Mr Henry Babatunde, who stated this while briefing newsmen on the preparation of the state for the festival said a total of 129 athletes would participate in 20 sporting events.
Babatunde who expressed optimism in improving on the last outing said the state would focus more on its areas of strength to achieve a successful outing at the National Sports Festival tagged “Asaba 2022”
He listed some of the sports in which the state had a comparative advantage to include, Wrestling, Table Tennis, Judo, Swimming and Taekwondo.
He said the state would be participating in the National festival to make statements saying plans and strategies had been put in place to ensure the state improved on the performance of the last edition on the medal’s table.
“We are looking at the areas of our strengths, we are looking at the Wrestling, Table Tennis, Judo, Kick-Boxing, Taekwondo, and Swimming. we are very hopeful at this time that we are going to do well.
He assured that the state would not win less than eight gold medals in swimming saying this would help to boost the state’s chances as well as winning more medals at the end of the sports festival.
“We are competing in 20 sporting events with 129 athletes and what we have now is more than what we had in the last festival, so this time around, Ondo state is very much hope that we are going to do well at the games,”
“When I came on board we met a bad swimming pool and that has always demoralised our swimmers but to the glory of God now, we have been able to bring back the swimming pool.
“We are very hopeful that anything that has to do with aquatic this time around we are going to have medals and I can beat my chest that we cannot have less than 8 gold in aquatic sport as far as this game is concerned,” he said.
Babatunde also commended Ondo State governor, Rotimi Akeredolu, for the prompt release of funds that made the planning for the competition easy and the close camping of athletes to start for easy monitoring.
“When we have a game like this, what we normally go for is what we call open camping. open camping is what it has to do with athletes coming from their various homes to have training in the morning and afternoon and after that, we go for close camping.
“So if you go around now, you will see our athletes and coaches doing training, some have completed their training while some are still doing their training.
“We have prepared and we are very hopeful that we are going to do well at this game because the level of preparedness is very high which will determine what we are going to get. We have qualified coaches and athletes on the ground,” he said.
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