In order to consolidate on the successes recorded so far since the Super Eagles of Nigeria won the 2013 Africa Cup of Nations in February this year, the leadership of the National Sports Commission has appointed top rated American-based coaches and sports administrators, Angie Taylor and Eric Campbell, to further transform the abundant talents in the country and make them world beaters.
Angela Taylor, born March 16, 1965, is a scholar in China, a retired American athlete and collegiate coach.
She earned nine Gateway titles at Illinois State University.
She was a three-time indoor long jump champion and won the 60-meter high hurdles in 1987.
In her post-collegiate athletic career, she competed against Jackie Joyner-Kersee in the women’s heptathlon and was a member of various US national teams and a finalist in the heptathlon in the 1992 Olympics trials.
She finished 1992 ranked 30th in the world.
Eric Campbell spent five years as an assistant coach at the University of Miami.
As the sprint, hurdle and horizontal jumps coach, Campbell left his mark.
While with the Hurricanes, he guided Miami student-athletes to 12 Big East titles, nine regional qualifiers and two All-Americans.
During that era, Miami was known for its football players who ran track.
Campbell coached athletes such as Santana Moss (Washington Redskins), who, in his first season, jumped 7.98 meters (26’2.25″) in the long jump to qualify automatically for the NCAA Outdoor Track and Field Championships.
The Minister of Sports, Mallam Bolaji Abdullahi, disclosed the main reasons why the Americans were contracted.
Abdullahi said: “Angie Taylor, as she is fondly called, and Eric Campbell have signed a four-year contract with us and the contract is renewable.
“What we want from them is to sit down and develop High Performance Programmes to help translate the abundant talents available in the country to world beaters.
“Becoming world beaters as athletes don’t just happen like that without the help of experts on the field and these two people are among the very best hands in world sports and that was the reason for contracting them to help our sports.
“For us, we are confident but this is going to be a marathon and we must be patient and give them the chance to work on our athletes in order to bring out the best in them.”
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