New arenas for an old wrestling tradition

The Gambia Wrestling Association and the Gambia Chamber of Commerce and Industry completed a European Union-funded, three-year culture-support project. On 24 November 2023 the project handed over newly built wrestling arenas at a ceremony held in Farafenni, distributing venues to Farafenni itself, to Brikama Ba in the Central River Region, and to a third West Coast location. An EU official's remarks framed traditional sport as part of the country's own identity and economic development, not only entertainment, and one speaker called wrestling one of the Gambia's oldest sports. ^{[thepoint-wrestling-arenas-2023]}

A photographed image of wrestlers grappling on a Gambian beach, outside any formal arena, is a reminder that the sport's everyday practice was, and by that 2013 date still was, never confined to purpose-built venues alone. ^{[commons-wrestlers-beach-2013]}