By IJEOMA OKIGBO

Musa Ehizoje, the Public Relations Officer (PRO) of the Nigeria Cricket Federation (NCF), has said that Nigeria?s Under 19 Women?s team tour of India would rub off on their World Cup performance.

Nigeria secured the lone Africa qualifying slot in Rwanda in September, ahead of the Under 19 World Cup scheduled to hold between Jan. 18 and Feb. 2 in Malaysia.

Ehizoje in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Thursday said that the experience the team garnered from the tour would be pivotal to the team?s World Cup success.

?After they qualified for the World Cup, the players have been training in the high-performance facilities we have in Edo and Lagos state but for the federation, it was not enough.

?We decided to have them travel to India and camp in Omtex ICWC Cricket Institute, which has one of the best cricket training structure and facility in India.

?They have been in India for about five days now; they have played a couple of games with Omtex team.

?The tour of India is necessary to put them in a competition mode, have other professionals analyse and make inputs on their preparations, as well as acclimatise with the Asian weather.

?They have had various training sessions, including yoga sessions to help them prepare physically and mentally.

?This trip to India will definitely rub off on the team when they begin their campaign at the World Cup. They will depart India on Sunday for Malaysia,? Ehizoje said.

NAN reports that the Nigerian Cricket team will kick off its campaign in Group C against Samoa on Jan 18, before facing New Zealand on Jan. 20 and South Africa on Jan. 22.

Nigeria and South Africa are the continent?s flag-bearers in the 16-nation tournament.

Nigeria picked the only qualification slot for Africa, to qualify, while South Africa gained automatic qualification to the event due to their rankings. NAN)

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