Pius Ayinor
21 October 2008
Lagos — As the African Men's Under-18 Basketball championship continues today in Alexandria, Egypt after yesterday's rest day, Nigerian Junior Tigers will battle their opponents from Congo today as leaders of Group B.
The Nigerians arrived Egypt last Thursday alongside Enyimba Football Club and began their campaign the following day with a game against Cote d'Ivoire while they defeated 66-53. On Saturday they stepped out against Kenya and defeated the East Africans 81-49 before the match against Algeria
The 69-63 victory over Algeria on Sunday pushed them to the top of the table with just two games left in the preliminary rounds.
"So far we going well; everything is okay with the team. The game against Algeria was a tough one but the team came off well. And so we on course and hopefully almost through the prelims in good shape," a Nigerian official told THISDAYSports from Alexandria last night.
The Nigerian team also expects a tough test from the Congolese in their match up today even though the Nigerians are entering the match as crowd favourites. The final and true test at the group level will, however, come their way tomorrow when they face the Angolans in the last group match.
The Nigerian team coached by Lati Erinfolami are in Egypt as defending champions having won the last competition in South Africa. The Junior Tigers also won the 2002 edition of the competition, which held in Cairo, Egypt amongst others. Three African teams are to qualify for the FIBA Junior Men's championship from this competition.
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