Nigerian women football team, nicknamed the Super Falcons, have threatened to boycott Wednesday's semi-final match against hosts Algeria at the ninth All- Africa Games because of "alleged shabby treatment by the Nigerian sports authorities," Nigerian news agency PANAPRESS reported on Tuesday.
A Nigerian official of the team was quoted as saying that the allowance of 800 U.S. dollars promised for each team member was withdrawn without explanation, and that the players had not been properly fed at the Games, currently being held in the Algerian capital, said the report.
"The Falcons did not play well in the first match against South Africa, as they had to come from two goals down to level at 2-2, due to poor feeding," said Bola Jegede, also a member of the Nigeria Football Association board.
"The players have not been eating the kind of food they are used to, as they have been fed dry French bread since they came to Algeria," she added.
She wondered why the National Sports Commission (NSC), Nigeria's sports body, would treat shabbily a team that was sure of giving the country a gold medal in female football, said the report.
Defending champions Nigeria defeated South Africa and snatched the gold medal of women's football in 2003 at the eighth All-Africa Games, which was held in the Nigerian capital Abuja.
In addition, Nigerian athletes at the Games have also threatened to boycott their events unless their daily allowance is raised from 100 dollars to 200 dollars each, according to the report.
But an official of the NSC, Patrick Ekeji, said the country's budget for the Games, which he put at about 15.7 million U.S. dollars, was based on a daily allowance of 100 dollars for each athlete.
Ekeji said there was no way anything could be added to the stipulated allowance, adding: "We are going to meet with the athletes to explain the situation to them."
Team Nigeria, which topped the medal table at the eighth All-Africa Games with 85 golds and 231 overall, has so far grabbed 19 golds and 68 medals in total, ranking the fifth in the medal table.
Source: Xinhua
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