Lagos — The proposed playing tour of the Flying Eagles to Nairobi, Kenya in preparation for the forthcoming African Youth Championship in Rwanda has been cancelled by the Nigeria Football Federation (NFF).

The Ladan Bosso led squad was scheduled to travel to Nairobi, Kenya on January 8 where they had been scheduled to play series of friendly matches as well as acclimatise in the country. (The weather in Kenya at this time of the year is similar to that of Rwanda.) However, in a telephone interview yesterday, the scribe of the federation, Dr. Bolaji Ojo-Oba, confirmed the tour plan has been shelved because of a late realisation that the East African nation is presently having fluctuating weather conditions, which may defeat the essence of acclimatisation.

"We have the plan to stay at least 10 days in Kenya and play some friendly matches in the country before crossing over to Rwanda, but latest reports we have about the weather is that it fluctuates and this might defeat the purpose of our stay if we cannot adapt to the situation we hope to face in Rwanda.

"We are now on Plan B, which entails the team flying straight to Kigali late next week for their acclimatisation. We now hope there would not be much distraction by the locals. We really don't need that if we really hope to achieve a positive result at the tournament," he explained.

By that arrangement, the team will now depart Lagos aboard Kenya Air next weekend to Nairobi before making the short trip to Kigali from there. For arriving early, however, the team will have to stay in an hotel outside the one provided by the Local Organising Committee (LOC) until the 14th when the official arrival time of all the eight teams would have kicked in. The tournament takes place from the 18th of January to February 1.

Nigeria will start the tournament with the Group B opening match against Egypt on the 19th at the Stade Regional, Kigali. Three days later, the Bosso-led team will take on South Africa. Their final group game will be against Cote d'Ivoire at the same stadium.

In Group A, host Rwanda will contend with oppositions from Mali, Ghana and Cameroon. The last edition of the competition was hosted and won by Congo two years ago after they defeated Zambia in the final match.

All the semi finalists will automatically qualify for the World Youth Championship coming up in Egypt in Septermber this year.