Senegalese female basketball player hopes to go global

21-year old Khady Camara is a budding female basketball player in the Senegalese capital, Dakar.

Camara, nick named Néné is part of the country’s women’s team at the Dakar National Superior Institute of Popular Education and Sports.

Her team is known as the Dakar University Club or DUC. It is made up of women players who are often referred to in Senegal’s sports press as the Duchesses.

For the first time in the national women’s basketball team’s history the Senegalese Lionesses made it past the first round at the world cup.

“Every player has her post and I am game leader. I control and lead the game on the court, like the trainer leads outside. On the court I have to have the character of a leader. I need to position my players. That is my role on the court, make passes, make the team play and everything. My size doesn’t stop me from doing everything I need to do”, Camara said.

Her dream is to join the great players she has seen through these courts make it to the global women’s basketball teams.

“My dream is to go international, I want to leave the country, ‘’ Camara said.

In 2017, the National Basketball Association (NBA) opened an Africa Academy in Senegal and last year it held the first NBA Academy Africa Women’s camp in Dakar.

Basketball is rising in Africa now that the NBA and the International Basketball Federation are to launch a basketball league this year.

The league features 12 club teams across Africa. The team will undertake qualification tourneys in Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia, Nigeria, Rwanda, Angola, South Africa and Senegal.

Reuters