NATIONAL tournaments billed to hold in the 2023 Nigeria Squash Federation (NSF) calendar year are awaiting sponsors’ approvals, The ICIR has learnt.

In 2022, The ICIR learnt 17 squash tournaments were held nationwide. But only five tournaments had been held by the middle of 2023.

In an interview with The ICIR, the NSF Technical Chairman, Yusuf Durosiolorun, expressed the federation’s hope that sponsors would give the nod to the series of tournaments slated to hold before the end of the year.

Durosiolorun said the ongoing Vranos second edition tournament holding in Lagos is the fifth the federation is organising this year.

“Last year, we played about 17 tournaments. This year, I am looking to play more this year, but you know these things depend on the sponsors,” he said.

He said the vision of the federation had been geared towards the development of the squash game at the grassroots level.

Also, the female national number one player, Rofiat Abdulaziz, told The ICIR that she had been funding herself to participate in the Professional Squash Association (PSA) tournaments outside the country.

“I am used to sponsoring myself. It is not as if I have someone sponsoring me. We don’t really have sponsors in squash. There is no personal sponsor for one individual; it is really rare in squash.

“It is not bad if we have sponsors from different companies,” Rofiat said.