The Lagos Flag Football League (LFFL) is a league created to amplify the game of American Football (non-contact) in Lagos and eventually, in other parts of Nigeria. In an interview with Adesina Pelumi, General Secretary of the league, he stated that one of the aims of setting up this league is to create a pipeline for the exportation of local talents to the international scene.
The league, which is scheduled to kick-off on the 5th of November, 2022, has a similar structure to what is obtainable in the National Football League, with respect to the organisation of a combine and draft prior to the starting of the league.
In a similar manner, the organisers of this league started with a combine and draft that featured 160+ athletes.
About the Combine/Draft.
The athletes were tested on various positional drills similar to what is obtainable at the NFL combine. After this combine, 90 players were drafted into the 6 founding teams in a very unique format.
The draft consisted of three rounds and was unique in the sense that the first round featured female players, while the second and third round consisted of experienced players and players that performed well in the combine, respectively.
This is going to be a one-day league that will be held at the school field of the annex campus of King’s College, Lagos and also comes with a hefty prize pool of 1Million Naira.
In addition to this, the league is also adopting a system where the players are rewarded for participating in the league, and to drive inclusion of women in American Football, they have decided to implement a rule where there will be at least 2 female players on the field of play for each team, at any given snap.
This league is organised by an athlete development company called Grow Kinesis, in conjunction with the FFL Talent Academy. They have also secured partnership with Africa Select, which is a coined body from USA select and USA football, and this partnership will further help to give exposure for the athletes participating in the league.
The league can be followed on their Instagram page @lffleague.
