1st February, 2011
Apart from being the overall winners of the just concluded West/Central Africa Junior Tennis Qualifiers in Winneba, Ghana, Team Nigeria have secured five tickets in the African Junior Championship, AJC.
Team Nigeria, handled by national junior coach, Mohammed Ubale, won two gold and five silver medals to emerge champions of the competition, beating host, Ghana and Cameroon to the second and third positions respectively.
Tennis Special gathered that as the Nigerian team were celebrating their victory, the five palyers were equally in euphoric mood for securing tickets to play in the AJC scheduled for Cairo, Egypt in April this year.
Umaru Balami will represent the country in the U-16 boys’ category, Emmanuel Idoko and Joseph Imeh will participate in the U-14 boys’ category, while Sarah Adegoke and Afolarin Akosile will play in the U-14 girls’ category.
Although, Balami lost in the final of the U-16 boys to Seydou Diallo of Senegal 7-6, 3-6, 3-6, he made it to the finals slated for Cairo. Adegoke, who played in the final of U-14 girls’ category also lost to Ghanaian Elizabeth in straight sets of 6-2, 6-3.
In the doubles event, the pair of Balami and Mohammed Mohammed failed to beat Ghana’s Francis Akpesi and his teammate in the boys’ U-16, while Idoko won his second gold with Imeh when they beat their Ghanaian counterparts to lift the boys’ U-14 Cup.
Adegoke and Zainab Oladimeji also lost to their Cameroonian opponents in the girls’ U-14 doubles.
Coach Ubale applauded the performance of Team Nigeria, saying that the overall results showed that the country’s players were better in the tournament. He noted that the players’ performance was better this year than last year’s AJC qualifiers.
“We’ll go back to the drawing board to correct the lapses we noticed in this competition and I’m sure we’ll present good players that would make Nigeria proud in Cairo,†he said.