13th African Games: Consider, Itshekiri, Olajide and Eyakpobeyan storm into 100m final

There will be no chance for a Nigerian clean sweep of the men and women’s 100m medals at the 13th African Games after the respective duo of Sunday Israel
Okon and Blessing Ogundiran failed to advance to the final on Monday evening.

The trio of Okon, Ushoritse Itshekiri and Consider Ekanem for the men and Ogundiran, Olayinka Olajide and Justina Eyakpobeyan had made it to the semifinals
of the event, raising expectations of a possible clean sweep.

For the men, a clean sweep of the 100m medals at the Games would have been unprecedented as the closest Nigeria got to doing that was in 2003 in Abuja when
Deji Aliu and Uchenna Emedolu finished first and second with the third entrant, Aaron Egbele finishing fifth in the final.

Consider who ran 10.37 to win his semifinal heat and Itshekiri who raced to a 10.29 finish to also win his semifinal heat are the two Nigerians that will
compete in Tuesday’s final and the best they can hope to achieve will be a 1-2 finish.

Cameroon’s Eseme Emmanuel Alobwede, the fastest on the day with his 10.23 finish and the only one to have broken 10 seconds (9.96) in the event will
definitely be the one to deny the Nigerians a repeat perfromance.

Only five Nigerian men have succeeded in winning the African Games 100m gold and all eyes will be on the duo of Consider and Itshekiri to see who succeeds
Raymond Ekevwo and become the sixth Nigerian winner in 2019 after Chidi Imoh (1987), Davidson Ezinwa (1995), Deji Aliu (2003) and Olusoji Fasuba (2007).

For the women, Ogundiran ran 11.77 to finish fifth in her semifinal heat, leaving only Olajide, winner of the first semifinal heat (11.46) and Eyakpobeyan,
winner of the second semifinal (11.61) to battle for the medals in the final.

The Nigerian duo will however have to run new lifetime bests to overcome the threat posed by Gambia’s Gina Bass who effortlessly ran 11.37, the fastest
qualifying time in the semifinals to finish 1 and 2.

Bass looks the overwhelming favourite to turn her 2019 silver to gold in 2024 but Olajide and Eyakpobeyan can feel inspired by their fairytale run so far in
2024 and one of them become the sixth Nigerian after Jumoke Bodunrin (1965), Tina Iheagwam (1987), Mary Onyali (1991, 1995 and 2003), Mercy Nku (1999) and
Oludamola Osayomi (2007 and 2011).