Medway Council has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Senegal National Olympic and Sports Committee for its squad to train at Medway Park.

Senegal's football team will use Priestfields Stadium, Gillingham Football Club's facilities, for training if they qualify for London.

Barbados' Paralympic team have already signed an agreement to train in Medway Park while several other towns in Kent have also announced deals for teams to train thee. 

These include Tonbridge School who are due to host Australia's athletics team and Maidstone, who have signed-up a number of countries, including Slovenia's gymnastics team and the judo squads from Belarus and Ukraine. 

Seydina Omar Diagne, the Chef de Mission for the Senegal Olympic Committee, said: "We have signed the agreement with Medway because it is a nice area that provides the right conditions for good Olympic preparation."

Senegal sent a team of 15 athletes in six sports to the Olympics in Beijing in 2008 but failed to win a medal.

Senegal made their debut in the Olympics at Tokyo in 1964 and competed in every Games since.

They have only ever won one medal, when Amadou Dia Ba finished second in the 400 metres hurdles in Seoul in 1988.

Sebastian Coe, the chairman of London 2012, welcomed the latest deal to be signed between a British town and a foreign team.

"Hopefully this sporting agreement will flourish into a longer-term relationship between Senegal and Medway benefiting both parties in sport, and perhaps even in other areas of interest like education or creating cultural exchange," he said.

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