The sports philanthropist noted that the players were ambassadors of Sierra Leone and if they wanted the country to develop through sports, they would have to fly the country’s flag high. He promised that his company would continue to support sporting events in the country and urged them to work as a team while showing responsibility to ensure that they would return home with laurels.

Director of Sorts, Ibrahim Bangura, thanked the benefactor for the gesture and implored the players to lay greater emphasis on their sporting career, adding that Kabadi was a typical Asian support with Sierra Leone being the only African country that was going to participate in the tournament.

“I would like to implore you to be disciplined, dedicated and patriotic because Sierra Leone has never done well at the world cup football tournament. She has done well in the Kabadi world cup tournament,” Bangura said.

The 28-man delegation, which comprised 24 players and 4 officials, are expected to leave have left the shores of Freetown yesterday Wednesday 2 November 2016 to participate in this year’s Kabadi world cup tournament in India.     

Kabadi is a traditional sporting discipline that is popular in India and less popular in Sierra Leone and other African countries. It comprises four stoppers and a raider, which is the attacker and the role of the raider is to stop the attacker from touching one of the four stoppers, who in return fights for them not to be touched by the raider.

Head coach, Samuel Eric Kamara, said they were well prepared for the tournament and determined to emerge as champions of this year’s Kabadi tournament. He said for the past three months the female category had engaged in vigorous training but used the occasion plead with sport-loving-fans to support the players.