By Luminous Jannamike, Abuja

The annual preseason tournament for women’s association football teams in Africa will no longer be called Flying Officers’ Cup, but Sheroes Cup, Ratels Sports Development Foundation (RSDF) confirmed on Wednesday.

Following a groundbreaking deal, in Sevilla Spain, brokered with the organizers of The Women’s Cup which features the best female teams across the globe, the Founder of RSDF, Barr. Paul Edeh, said the winner of the Sheroes Cup would represent Nigeria in the African playoffs for the yearly competition in the United States.

Briefing journalists in Abuja, Edeh explained that the new name of the annual pre-season tournament was a way of celebrating the heroics of African women in various fields of human endeavour.

He said, “Recall that in the past three or four years, starting from 2019, we have consistently organized a preseason tournament for women’s teams across Africa to prepare themselves to prepare them towards the commencement of each league season. This year is not an exception.

“For the past two seasons, we have been holding the pre-season tournament under the aegis of the Flying Officers’ Cup.

“But today, I’m here to announce that we are deviating from that path. Henceforth, the pre-season tournament is no longer to be known as the Flying Officers’ Cup, but rather to be known as the Sheroes cup.

“Fundamentally, it is one and the same tournament, but just that the name is rechristened and the reason for the name change is principal to give us the opportunity to be able to celebrate more women who have achieved no mean feat in their respective endeavours.

“Over the years, and over the centuries, women have continued to leave an indelible marks in the annals of our society. I will feel that such women should be celebrated well, and that’s why moving forward, the permanent name for the pre-season tournament shall now be the Sheroes cup.

However, Edeh who doubles as the chief financier of the Sheroes Cup, also announced a restructuring of the pre-season tournament.

He said, “Fundamentally, in the past, we have held the pre-season tournament, having to have a combined tournament where we have team from the premiership, the championship and the amateur coming together to play in one tournament but for this year, we’ve decided to do something a bit different.

“We’re going to hold two different tournaments back-to-back. One will be dedicated principally to premiership teams, while the second one will be dedicated to both championship and the nationwide league, or even other amateur teams that are interested.”

He explained that the first edition of the Sheroes Cup, which is for the Premiership teams, no less than 10 teams are expected to participate.

“However, if the number of participating teams are even less than that, we intend that all the teams will be grouped into two so that they can have nothing less than five games minimum before the end of the tournament at the end of the day, we’ll have four teams qualifying to play for the semi finals and of course the finals to determine the overall winner,” he added.