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Oshoala, Oladipo, Shittu Among Early Arrivals as Super Falcons Open Camp for Senegal Friendlies

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Nigeria’s senior women’s national team, the Super Falcons, have officially commenced camping in Ikenne, Ogun State, ahead of their international friendly matches against Senegal as preparations intensify for the 2026 Women’s Africa Cup of Nations (WAFCON).

READ ALSO: Athletics Experts Dissect Stunted Growth of University Sports in Nigeria, Point to Corruption and Poor Infrastructure

Among the early arrivals in camp on Monday were six-time African Women’s Player of the Year Asisat Oshoala, defender Shukurat Oladipo, and midfielder Kafayat Shittu, as the nine-time African champions began assembling for the crucial double-header.

The Super Falcons opened camp at the Remo Stars Sports Institute in Ikenne, where they will host Senegal in two friendly matches scheduled for June 5 and June 8.

The fixtures form a key part of Nigeria’s preparations for WAFCON 2026, which will be held in Morocco from July 25 to August 16.

Head coach Justine Madugu and members of his technical crew arrived at the camp on Monday morning to oversee the team’s preparations, while the remaining invited players are expected to join the squad in the coming days.

According to the team’s media department, all 23 invited players have communicated their travel plans and are expected to report to camp as activities gather momentum.

The friendly encounters against Senegal will provide Madugu with an important opportunity to evaluate his squad, strengthen team cohesion, and fine-tune tactical strategies ahead of the continental showpiece.

Nigeria will be aiming to reclaim the WAFCON title and further reinforce their status as Africa’s most successful women’s national team. The tournament also serves as a qualification pathway for the 2027 FIFA Women’s World Cup in Brazil.

The top four teams at WAFCON 2026 will secure automatic qualification for the World Cup, while the fifth-placed team will advance to an intercontinental playoff for a final chance to reach the global tournament.

With preparations now underway in Ikenne, the Super Falcons will be determined to build momentum, sharpen their competitive edge, and assemble a squad capable of mounting a strong challenge for continental glory in Morocco.

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Nigeria Opens Billie Jean King Cup Campaign with Hard-Fought Victory Over Burundi

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Team Nigeria made a winning start to its 2026 Billie Jean King Cup Africa Group III Qualifier campaign after defeating Burundi 2-1 in an entertaining opening-day tie in Gaborone, Botswana.

READ ALSO: Tennis: Team Nigeria Departs for Botswana as Billie Jean King Cup Quest Begins

Sports247 reports that the Nigerian ladies displayed resilience and composure to secure a crucial victory in their first outing of the tournament, boosting their hopes of earning one of the two promotion spots available.

Nigeria’s No. 1 player, Khadijat Mohammed, gave the team a dream start by claiming victory in the opening singles match to hand the West Africans a 1-0 lead against Burundi.

Burundi responded by levelling the contest in the second singles rubber, setting up a decisive doubles encounter with everything at stake.

The experienced pairing of Oyinlomo Quadre and Success Ogunjobi rose to the occasion, producing an impressive performance to seal the decisive doubles match and hand Nigeria a 2-1 triumph.

The winning moment came when Success Ogunjobi unleashed a powerful forehand winner, sparking celebrations among the Nigerian contingent and confirming victory in the opening tie.

The result gives Team Nigeria an early advantage as they continue their quest for promotion in the week-long continental competition, which features 11 nations battling for just two places in Africa Group II.

With confidence boosted by the opening-day success, Coach Rotimi Akinloye and his players will now shift their attention to their remaining group fixtures, knowing that every victory could prove decisive in Nigeria’s promotion ambitions.

The Billie Jean King Cup, regarded as the women’s equivalent of the Davis Cup, remains the world’s largest annual international women’s team tennis competition, and Nigeria has taken the first positive step in its mission to return to a higher tier of African tennis.

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NDLEA intercepts South African lady with 3-year-old son as cover to traffic heroin

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A 38-year-old South African lady, Ms. Will Jessica Ann has been arrested by operatives of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport (NAIA) Abuja after she was found to have concealed 14 large blocks of heroin weighing 5.75 kilograms in her luggage, using her three-year-old son as a cover to beat security checks and evade thorough screening.

The suspect was arrested by NDLEA officers on Monday 6th July 2026 during the inward clearance of passengers on Qatar Airways flight QR 1433 from Doha to Abuja. Though she initially denied travelling with check-in bags, but after operatives were able to quickly establish that the two bags containing the drugs had tags which tallied with the claim tags attached to her passport, she recounted and admitted ownership of the bags adding that she forgot she checked in the two bags.
She claimed to have travelled from Cambodia through Doha to Abuja. Intelligence leading to her arrests indicates she is a member of a transnational drug trafficking organization along with her husband/partner, Jan Coenraad De Jager, based in Cambodia from where they operate their drug network along the Cambodian-South African axis.
In another successful interdiction operation, NDLEA officers at the terminal 2 arrival hall of the Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMIA) Ikeja Lagos on 28th June 2026 intercepted a commercial motorcycle operator popularly known as ‘Okada rider’, 48-year-old Onyechere Daniel Chinadu following his arrival from Madagascar via Addis Ababa aboard an Ethiopian Airways flight.
A thorough search of his back pack, which he had checked in, led to the discovery of 87 wraps of methamphetamine concealed within cloths in his bag. In his statement, Onyechere claimed he has been working for 15 years as an Okada rider at Oke-Afo area of Lagos before his Uganda based friend recruited him into drug trafficking.
He said he ingested the recovered pellets of methamphetamine in Uganda before embarking on his planned journey to Madagascar to deliver the drug consignment. He however said that upon arrival in Madagascar, he was denied entry by Immigration authorities. As a result, his friend and sponsor, Ozor Igo, based in Uganda rerouted his flight to Lagos, where he was eventually arrested by NDLEA officers.
The suspect was unable to state the exact number of pellets he had ingested in Uganda and as a result, he was placed under excretion observation for a period of three days. Between the date of his arrest and 1st of July, he was able to excrete 13 pellets in addition to the initial 87 wraps recovered from him, bringing the total number to 100 wraps of methamphetamine with a gross weight of 1.715 kilograms.
At the Apapa seaport in Lagos, a total of 8,287 nylon bags of Canadian Loud weighing 4,143.5 kilograms worth over N10.3 billion in street value were discovered in a container imported from Canada during a joint examination of the shipment by NDLEA officers, Customs personnel and other security agencies on Friday 10th July 2026.
The discovery followed weeks of targeted tracking and monitoring of the shipment since its departure from Montreal, Canada, by operatives of the Maritime Intelligence Unit of NDLEA in close collaboration with the Apapa Strategic Command of the Agency. Meanwhile, an attempt to export a 2.5kg skunk, a strain of cannabis, concealed in a gas compressor going to Cyprus through a courier company in Lagos has been thwarted by NDLEA operatives of the Directorate of Operation and General Investigation(DOGI).
With the same zeal, Commands and formations of the Agency across the country continued their War Against Drug Abuse (WADA) sensitization activities in schools, worship centres, work places and communities among others in the past week. These include: WADA enlightenment lecture for students and staff of Nnodo Secondary School, Abakaliki, Ebonyi; Government Girls Secondary School, Sabon Gida, Sharada, Kano; Royal Jesuit College, Agbado Ekiti; and Community Secondary School, Idofa, Ogun, while the leadership of Zone 14 Command of NDLEA paid a WADA advocacy visit to Rivers State Governor, Sir Siminalayi Fubara at Government House Port Harcourt, among others.
While commending the officers and men of DOGI, MMIA, NAIA, MIU, and, Apapa Commands of the Agency for the arrests and seizures, Chairman/Chief Executive Officer of NDLEA, Brig. Gen. Mohamed Buba Marwa (Rtd) noted their drug supply reduction efforts balanced with WADA sensitization activities while he charged them and their compatriots across the country not to rest on their past laurels.

The post NDLEA intercepts South African lady with 3-year-old son as cover to traffic heroin appeared first on Business Today NG.

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