Irene, 16, has quickly emerged as one of the country's top basketball prodigies after enjoying a stellar 2024, captaining England to U16 Four Nations gold and claiming the tournament’s MVP award in the process as well as featuring for Great Britain at the U16 Women's EuroBasket.
Her impressive exploits have led to her being shortlisted in the top 10 for SportsAid’s prestigious One-to-Watch Award.
The annual award, launched in 2006, recognises Britain’s brightest young sporting prospects and has previously been won by Olympic champions Tom Daley and Alex Yee and Paralympic gold medallist Hollie Arnold.
The top 10 athletes have been selected from around 1,000 rising stars, supported by SportsAid, across more than 60 different sports in 2024.
However, Irene is not the only one in the Irene household pursuing athletic superstardom.
Both her older brother, Justin, and her younger sister, Jane, are flying for Manchester City, with the latter recently on international duty with England at the U17 Women’s World Cup.
While some might expect a sibling rivalry to bubble up, Irene says her high-performing family’s success is aided by mutual support, leaning on each other whenever possible.
She said: “Justin plays for City and he also plays with the U19 England squad, and then Jane was at the U17 Women's World Cup representing England and she was the youngest there in her tournament, she’s 14.
“You could see rivalry, but I think if we just push each other to be the best players that we can be.
“With basketball and football, even though it's different sports, I feel like we're all striving to just be a better player and a better person.
“I really like helping my siblings, my brother and sister, I give them advice and stuff like that. We always find time to pray together or after a long weekend, we'd always find time to just sit and just debrief on our day.
“We're all in different places, so we just talk about what happened that day. Maybe Jane had a game, so then she'd come home and talk about her game, then I'd talk about my game, then maybe Justin would come and talk about his game, so it’s just constant conversation.”
While her siblings look on course for a fruitful career in their homeland, Irene is setting her sights on success stateside, with the US still the global pinnacle of basketball.
She won an all-expenses paid trip to the USA-based Hoop Group camp after being selected as one of the best five U17s in the country at the inaugural Queens of the Court tournament but is now eager to permanently plant her feet in the States as she prepares to up sticks for university.
“The overall ambition is, post 18, leave England and go to America and join an NCAA Division One basketball college where I can enhance my basketball,” she added.
“I want to do this alongside education, which I also think is really important. Just constantly growing in the sport that I love and constantly just trying to improve.”
Basketball is far from Irene’s sole commitment, with the 16-year-old needing to balance the sporting side of life with academia.
This is not something she does begrudgingly, however, and as a keen reader, she knows full well how important it is to do well in school.
Nevertheless, conflicts between school and sport have still posed barriers for Irene, often forcing her to demonstrate her devotion to achieving glory on the court.
“The main challenge is just me balancing education alongside my basketball, because I'm really up with education and I feel like it's really a necessity as well as sport,” she said.
“During my GCSEs, I was doing all those all-star tournaments. I had a game in Southampton and then I came back [to Manchester] the next day for my maths GCSE. It was just a lot of time balancing, which was challenging.
“I would train and shoot in the mornings at six o'clock before school, then I'd do school. Then I'd have private sessions with my coaches like three times a week and do extra practice with an external strength and conditioning coach to give me a physical advantage over my peers.”
Odoavwoduo has been provided with crucial financial support by SportsAid over the last two years – with the charity also offering personal development opportunities through workshops and visits.
And after being shortlisted for the One-to-Watch Award, Odoavwoduo has hailed the charity for facilitating her progression as an elite athlete.
“It's been very important,” she said. “All the help that I've been given, the strength and conditioning stuff that I've been given, the funding for all my summer activities where I've been going abroad to different countries for training - the financial help was really amazing for me.
“I really appreciate all of the aid that I've been given and I hope to continue to use it to better myself and to grow.”
SportsAid’s annual One-to-Watch Award is being supported by Aldi – the charity’s Official Supermarket Partner. The winner of this year’s Award will be revealed in December with each of the top 10 receiving cash boosts and special in-person visits at their training environments to celebrate their achievements.
Words - SportsAid
.
.
