Aruna, Edem, others for African Cup, Olympics qualifiers in Kigali
The Nigeria Table Tennis Federation named Quadri Aruna, Offiong Edem, Olajide Omotayo, and Fatimo Bello to represent the country at the 2024 ITTF African Cup and Olympics Qualification Tournament, which will be held in Kigali, Rwanda, from May 12 to 18.
According to the tournament's prospectus, each country is anticipated to send two men and two women to the African Cup, with Egypt sending three players in each category. Rwanda will present four men and four women as the host nation.
In the list of participants provided by the continental table tennis regulating body, African Table Tennis Federation, Omar Assar of Egypt, the men's singles defending champion, will be joined by her compatriot, Hana Goda who will also be defending her title in the women’s singles.
Aruna, a finalist at the 2022 edition in Lagos, Nigeria, was injured in the final, forcing her to forfeit the match to Assar after coming back from defeat to tie the score. He led in the seventh game, but a thigh injury caused him to hand over the trophy to the Egyptian in front of the Lagos fans.
The Nigerian, who had slid to 19th place in the ITTF rankings and was hoping to utilize the tournament to move back to the top of the world rankings, would face another Herculean assignment against the Egyptian trio Assar, Mohamed El-Beiali, and Youssef Abdel-Aziz.
Omotayo, who has yet to demonstrate why he was crowned the 2019 African Games champion, will be looking forward to another match against some of Africa's best players in Kigali.
Edem, who led Nigeria to a silver medal at the 13th African Games in Ghana, hopes to repeat Accra's outstanding achievement in Kigali.
Bello, a finalist in the 2022 edition, must have put her subpar performance in Ghana behind her in the hopes of repeating her 2022 form in Rwanda.
When the Olympics Qualification Tournament begins on May 16 at the BK Arena in Kigali, Aruna hopes to make his fourth Olympic Games debut. Egypt will not be competing because they have already chosen their tickets at the 2023 African Championships in
Tunisia.
