Olympics 2012: Days Eight And Nine For Team Nigeria

By Arinze Ude. For Day Eight; In Athletics, Nigeria’s hopes of an Olympic medal were dashed yesterday as the athletes failed to build on their previous performance. Obinna Metu, Egwero Ogho-Oghene and Emelieze Peter all failed to qualify for the semi-finals of the Men’s 100M. They finished 5th, 4th and 5th with time of 10.35, 10.38 and 10.22 in their respective Heats. Although, Emelieze clocked his season best time, it wasn’t enough to book a place in the next round. Amaechi Morton was disqualified in the Men’s 400M Hurdles semi-finals. Blessing Okagbare put in a poor display in the women’s 100M final finishing in last position in 11.01seconds. Earlier, she finished first in semi final group 3 with a personal best time of 10.92seconds. Nigeria’s Gloria Asumnu finished 4th in the Heats with a time of 11.21. Osazuwa Uhunoma, our sole ambassador in Heptathlon event finished in 24th position as Jessica Ennis of Great Britain took the Gold medal. Stanley Gbagbeke cleared a distance of 7.59metres to finish 27th in the Men’s Long Jump event. Regina George and Omotosho Omolara couldn’t replicate the form they showed yesterday in the Women’s 400M event as they finished 5th and 4th in their respective semi-final groups with a time of 51.35 and 51.41 seconds respectively. In Basketball, The Argentines booked a place in the Quarter-final of the competition at the expense of D’Tigers. D’Tigers, led by Ike Diogu who picked up 16points and 11 rebounds, lost 79-93 to the South Americans.   For Day Nine; In Boxing, Nigeria’s Edith Ogoke moved on to the Quarter finals after defeating Elena Vystropova of Azerbaijan in the Women’s Middleweight 75kg Round of 16 clash. Weightlifter Maryam Usman finished last in the women’s 75kg weightlifting competition. Sprinter, Muisat Ajoke Odumosu qualified for the Semi-finals of the Women’s 400M category after finishing third in Heat 2 of the preliminaries with a time of 54.93seconds.