Intro:

For many years an African soccer powerhouse, Nigeria is now trying to make an impact in the world of cricket - but it will not be easy .

Script:

Football might be Nigeria's favourite sport but it might soon have a rival. Cricket is finding favour in schools for poor children and in the streets of some of the nation's most violence-torn cities.

British colonialists introduced the game to boarders in Nigeria's top secondary schools in the 19th century and Nigeria played its first recorded international game in 1904 against present-day Ghana, but a lack of cash to buy equipment, has stopped cricket's appeal over the years, leaving most Nigerians today puzzled by the bat-and-ball game.

That is changing as cricket federation officials adapt the game to Nigeria's realities.

Fielders at some matches don't wear uniforms and batsmen don't don helmets.

They might use an eight-dollar (USD) locally-produced version of the professional bats that can cost hundreds of dollars.

Instead of a hard leather ball, players make do with tennis balls.

SOUNDBITE (English):

"Cricket gave me everything. Cricket gave me life because there are a lot of boys on the street. You don't know what is going on in their minds. Cricket was there for me, any time I needed anybody to be with me. So, I guess it is all I have got."

SUPER CAPTION: Saheed Olawale Akolade:

SOUNDBITE (English):

"We need to push down that age, to the point where a kid is born, it is two or three - he is already thinking of playing cricket. To make it as popular as football."

SUPER CAPTION: Nigeria cricket federation president Kwesi Sagoe

More than an alternative sport, the game also serves as one more avenue to escape hardship in a country of more than 160 million people with few opportunities for its youth.