Thousands of youngsters aspiring to hone their football skills today thronged the Practice Pitch of the National Stadium, Surulere, Lagos and the Liberty Stadium, Ibadan for the on-going season 3 of the Airtel Rising Stars national U-17 Tournament which is at its zonal championship stage.
The youngsters, male and female, had come out hoping for opportunities to impress the team of select coaches who have been saddled with the responsibility of picking quality teams that will compete for honours in the male and female categories at the national championship slated to hold later in August.
The Lagos and Ibadan zonal championship matches has been running on a three-leg format beginning with road shows within the designated host cities, followed by the screening of registered players and finally, the play-off matches which run in a league format.
In the qualifying matches decided at the Liberty Stadium, Ibadan, Ondo male team defeated their Osun counterpart 5-3 to book a semi-final place with Ekiti which it lost by a lone goal. In the other match between Oyo and Kwara, the Oyo team ran away with a 3-0 victory.
In the female category, Osun defeated Ondo 5-4 via penalties while Oyo team A handed down a 2-0 defeat to Oyo team B. Kwara was comprehensive in their victory as they drubbed Ekiti 5-0 in the second semi-final match.
The third place matches in the two categories will hold Thursday with the final to be decided on Friday. In the male category, Ondo will square up against Osun, while Oyo will lock horns with their counterparts from Ondo in the female category.
To determine the zonal champions, Kwara will face Oyo in the girls final, while Ekiti will have their hands full against an Oyo side which has enjoyed home support from the fans.
Aside determining the zonal champions, the play-offs double as qualifiers for the ARS national championship slated for Lagos from August 21 to 24th.
Already, Kaduna, Abuja, Enugu and Port Harcourt male and female teams have booked their places in the Lagos National finals following the successful completion of the inter-state championships in their zones.
The Airtel Rising Stars U-17 Tourney, in its third year running, is a pan-African initiative of Airtel Africa, designed to provide support for the development of football talents across African markets.
The competition is aimed at discovering talented students (male and female) of secondary school age and providing them the opportunity to polish their football skills and develop into soccer stars.
As part of the tournament, top teams from 17 African countries including Nigeria will compete against one another to determine the ARS African Champion, scheduled for Nigeria in September. This will be followed by a week-long football clinic with Arsenal FC of England for most outstanding male and female players discovered during the national championship.
