Keeping Tolulope Arotile Legacies Alive, As Flying Officers Cup Lights Up Abuja

 

By Alumona Onyekachi

….. Secured AIT Broadcast right to aired live match.

Naija Ratels Pre-Season Championship also known as Flying Officers Cup is a yearly preseason tournament. They organized it for the women association football teams in Africa with the support of the Nigerian Women Football League. The Flying Officers Cup features the best teams from the neighboring African countries and Nigeria Women Premier League. They described it as the highest preseason tournament for the Nigerian women's football club since its inception in 2019.

The organizers of the Flying officers’ Cup, Ratel Sports Development Foundation of Abuja have organized some innovative programs. This is to mark this year’s  3^rd edition of the Women Pre-season football competition. They scheduled it to immortalize Tolulope Arotile, the late Flying Officer who stood out as a combat flight officer. The program will also help to keep her legacies alive.

According to Barrister Maxwell Edeh, the competition offers a pre-season training opportunity for the Women Football Club in the Country. Barrister Edeh the founder of the Ratel Football Club added that this year will feature two clubs. They will be coming from the Benin Republic and Ghana.

While addressing journalists, Barrister Edeh stated that the scheduled date for the competition will be October 10 to 24. The venue is area 10 Sports Complex in Abuja. He added that the foundation has mapped out N50 million to care for participants' welfare and accommodate more teams.

This year's edition will record 16 teams unlike the 2^nd edition of 2020 that had only 8 teams. The 16 teams are to competed during the football event of the Independence Anniversary Celebration. Barrister Edeh added that the tournament would have several teams competing for honors from the Champion­ship, Premier, and Nationwide leagues.

Flying Officer’s Cup Final to be Aired Live on AIT

The organizers of the competition have secured three facilities. They include Area 3, Aguinyi Ironsi Canton­ment, and the Goals Project facilities. Barrister Edeh announced that the first four teams that finished tops in the competition will be awarded prizes.  These prizes range from N1 mil­lion, 500,000, 300,000, and N200,000 respectively.

The organizing team of the Flying Officer’s Cup has also entered into a partnership with the Africa Independent Television AIT. They had announced that AIT will ensure that the competition is beamed live for 14 days that it will last.

Barr Edeh while speaking on the partnership explained that they choose AIT as the official media based on its support. The Media broadcasting group had long supported the growth of Women’s football.  He added that AIT is among the largest operated terrestrial television network and has about 24 stations in Nigeria.