The 15th edition of the annual NNPC/Shell Cup football competition for All Nigerian Secondary Schools has been stated to kick-off by December.
According to reports reaching ‘Imo Trumpeta’ from the organizers of the annual grassroots football showpiece, the state finals of the competition has been scheduled for December 1 to 2.
Nine zonal centres have been accredited for the zonal preliminary games namely, Yenogoa, Osogbo, Benin, Lokoja, Jalingo, Ilorin, Katsina, Enugu and Akure. The games will take place from December 11 to 15.
The source further revealed that the quarter finals of the cadet competition will then move to four centres, PortHarcourt, Shagamu, Minna and Kaduna from January 24 to 25 while the semifinals takes place in Lagos on February 25, as the grandfinal and losers game are due also in Lagos on 27th of same month.
This years competition is expected to be the best packaged so far since it’s inception as the sponsors are set to splash 8 million naira (about 51,000 dollars) as prize money.
According to a break down made available to pressmen, this seasons champions will pocket N3.5 million, the runners up N2 million and the third place team N1 million.
The championship was described by Tony Attah, Shell Petroleum and Development Company (SPDC) top shot, as means of enhancing the eligibility process that will discourage age cheats as well as improve awareness.
He said, the states and zonal finals will be monitored very closely so that students with exceptional talents won’t escape the eye of football scouts assembling the state academicals teams.
The likes of Solomon Okoronkwo, Bola Ezekiel, Ambrose Vanzekin, Isaac Promise, Emmanuel Sariki, Chinedu Obasi, Femi Opabumi, Ajani Ibrahim among others were all discovered during the shell cup games.
Imo State won the competition back to back when Coach Ramson Madu’s young Lads triumphed in the 2010 and 2011 edition before he moved on to join the Coaching crew of Heartland football club, Owerri.
