Adegoke out as Team Nigeria Athletics Team jets out to Riyadh for Islamic Solidarity Games
Team Nigeria’s track and field contingent is set to depart for Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, on Thursday for the 2025 Islamic Solidarity Games, but not without notable absences.
Olympic 100m finalist Enoch Adegoke and top shot putter Chukwuebuka Enekwechi have both opted out of the competition, trimming the athletics squad to about 15 athletes.
The team has been training at the Moshood Abiola Stadium in Abuja in preparation for the Games, which began earlier this month.
According to officials at the Athletics Federation of Nigeria (AFN) secretariat, the reduced contingent will now represent the country in the athletics events scheduled to run from November 17 to 20 at the Prince Faisal Bin Fahd Stadium in Riyadh.
The athletics programme will kick off on November 17 with the men’s hammer throw final, while the men’s 100m event, a one-day competition, will also take place that same day.
However, it will be without Adegoke, the 2021 Nigerian champion who made history as the first wholly home-based athlete to qualify for the Olympic 100m event on Nigerian soil.
Adegoke further cemented his legacy by reaching the final of the blue riband event at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, becoming the first Nigerian to do so since Davidson Ezinwa’s appearance in the 1996 final in Atlanta, USA.
His withdrawal follows that of Enekwechi, a consistent medal contender in the shot put, who had earlier pulled out of the Games.
