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By JOE APU
The return of First Bank to the continental stage after six years absence is not an exciting one after all as the vice champions of the Zenith Bank Women’s League are struggling to find their feet at the ongoing Africa Women’s Basketball League in Cairo, Egypt.
The two-time African champions 2003 and 2009 for the second time in a row at the championship slumped to their opponent Kenya Ports Authority (KPA) 82-53.
Having lost their opening game 85-48 to defending champions Ferroviario Maputo, the Nigerian side failed to live up to expectation as they fell to KPA 19-13, 26-11, 19-13 and 18-16 in the four quarters of the game.
Despite First Bank’s Wandoo Hembam scoring a game high 21 points, it was not enough to see her team to victory with just one game left in the first round.
Though the game witnessed 6 lead changes KPA’s were better in the better side in defensive rebounds with 43 to First Bank’s 28 just as the former scored 40 points in the paint to 8 from First Bank. The Kenya champions also recorded 22 points from fast breaks to 12 for First Bank and garnered 19/13 points off turnovers.
The Elephant Girls will face FAP on Tuesday and Coach Julie Negedu who had high hopes of taking victory in their second game is now in prayers for her wards to grab one win.
“We need to get our chemistry of playing together right and we need to work on that a lot because one of players came just at the verge of the commencement of the championship and she didn’t understand a lot of things but we will go back to the drawing board to have a better strategy going forward.
Also, we will look at areas we have not done well and prepare better for the game against FAP especially with the kind of intensity we started the game against KPA. It’s a game we look forward to winning,” a confident Negedu stated.
