Nigeria’s Dream of Wrestling Medals in Tatters

*Oborodudu, Adekuoroye fail to reach semi finals
Duro Ikhazuagbe in Rio
Team Nigeria’s dream of winning medals in the wrestling events of the ongoing 2016 Olympic Games here in Rio de Janeiro has continued to varnish as two of the country’s prospects, Blessing Oborodudu and Oduanyo Adekuoroye crashed out of their respective categories yesterday afternoon in the quarter-final matches at Carioca Arena.

Oborududu who is the captain of the Nigerian wrestling team lost 3-1 to Mongolia’s Battsetseg Soronzonbold in the 63 kg class while Adekuoroye on the other hand got beaten 5-0 flat by Mattsson Sofia Magdalena of Sweden in the 53kg class.
Earlier, on Wednesday afternoon, three other Nigerian wrestlers – Mercy Genesis, Hannah Reuben and Aminat Adeniyi – were all eliminated from the preliminary rounds of the women’s wrestling events.

Genesis fell 5-0 to Poland’s Iwona Matkowska in women’s freestyle 48kg, Reuben lost 4-1 to Canadian wrestler, Dorothy Yeats in the women’s freestyle 69kg, while Adeniyi also lost 3-1 to Finland’s Petra Olli in the women’s freestyle 58kg.

All the five wrestlers were among the six medal hopefuls in the squad led by former Olympic gold medalist, Daniel Igali.
Until last week, these wrestlers had no sparring partners to train with as those earlier listed to accompany them here were dropped as cost saving measure by the Federal Ministry of Youth and Sports officials.
Igali who doubles as both president of the federation and technical director had to resort to helping to do sparring rounds with the wrestlers until competition started.