The battle for the N6.5million at stake in the first Lagos International Table Tennis Classics begins today at Molade Okoya-Thomas Hall of Teslim Balogun Stadium in Lagos.
The International Table Tennis Federation (ITTF)/ Africa Table Tennis Federation (ATTF)-approved tournament has players from Egypt, Italy, Lithuania, Senegal, Congo Brazzaville, Congo DRC, Ghana, Togo, Benin and Russia.
The highest prize money tournament in Africa is organized by the Main Organising Committee of Lagos International Sports Classics in collaboration with the Nigeria Table Tennis Federation (NTTF) and it also has world ranking status.
Current Africa Champion, Omar Assar, Italy’s Mihai Bobocica and the Congo Brazzaville’s team led by Nigeria-born Saka Suraju had their first training session yesterday at the venue with most of them vowing to upstage Nigeria at the tournament.
Team Nigeria will be led by Segun Toriola and Funke Oshonaike while other members in the team are Aruna Quadri, Ojo Onaolapo and Kazeem Makanjuola will compete in the men’s singles. To join Oshonaike in the women’s singles are Edem Ofiong, Janet Effiom and Rasheedat Ogundele.
According to the Chairman, MOC, Wahid Oshodi, the stage is set for the kick off of the championship after the successful staging of the qualifiers at the weekend.
Over 42 Nigerian players will compete in the men’s singles, while more than 20 of them will feature in the women’s singles.
“We are fully ready as we have done everything within our reach to ensure that we provide the best facilities and we are hoping that fans will throng the venue to catch a glimpse of what they are expecting.
This is just the beginning of good things to come and we hope our players will gain from the experience from this championship,” Oshodi said.
10 events will be jostled for by the players in the junior and senior categories.
Winners in the men and women singles will get N.8m and N.6m respectively while players that make it to round of 16 of the singles event will get cash reward.
“We believe that organising this competition will help our players and expose them to other top players from other nations. We are hoping that it will be an annual event will help to improve the lot of the sport in the country,” Oshodi added.
He added that tournament is made possible by the support of the private sector and the Lagos State Government.
An excited ATTF President, Khaled El-Salhy, believes the staging of the tournament would give Nigeria the opportunity to host a major tournament in 2014.
His words: “ITTF/ATTF is looking to organize a brand new event next year tagged “2014 ITTF-Africa Top 16 Cup” which should be in the second half of June 2014 as qualification for ITTF World Cups next year, and we believe it will be good to start this competition in Nigeria. As I am hoping for a successful 2013, as well as envisaging that the Lagos International Classics will be among the ITTF World Tour Calendar in 2014 and this is to prove to ITTF that Africa could host sanctioned events in a professional way.”
