Nationwide champion, Bose Odusanya, on the weekend in Lagos, defeated NSCDC’s Amina Fashola so as to add the yearly Molade Okoya-Thomas Nationwide Desk Tennis Championships crown t her trophy chest.
Saturday’s win was Odusanya’s tenth consecutive girls’s singles title at Africa’s longest-running desk tennis match, which marked its 56th anniversary on the Teslim Balogn Stadium in Lagos.
Regardless of being seeded fourth, Odusanya raised her sport to bulldoze her method into the ultimate, the place she defeated Fashola (8-11, 11-4, 11-9, 11-6, 11-8), to develop into the primary participant within the competitors’s historical past to assert 10 consecutive titles.
A delighted Odusanya described this 12 months’s win because the hardest, noting it was the primary time the match was performed as a nationwide occasion. She counseled her opponent for placing up battle within the entertaining last.
Within the males’s singles, nationwide champion, Matthew Kuti, additionally maintained his unbeaten run, profitable his first senior title on the championship with a convincing 4-1 victory over Kwara’s Abbulbasit Abdulfatai.
Kuti, the highest seed within the males’s singles, entertained dignitaries, together with Ogun State First Woman, Mrs Bamidele Abiodun and former Kwara State First Woman, Mrs Oluwatoyin Saraki, in addition to the house followers. He confidently claimed his first senior title on the match.
Regardless of shedding rose from a 7-11 first spherical loss to stun his left-handed opponent with a commanding 4-1 (7-11, 11-8, 11-6, 11-5, 11-9) win.
After his victory, Kuti counseled the household of the match’s initiator for making it a nationwide occasion.Within the U-15 finals, Usman Ayoola of Oyo State and Chinenye Okafor claimed the boys’ and women’ titles respectively.
Ayoola defeated his Oyo State counterpart, Ahmed Ayatullahi, 3-0 (11-8, 11-8, 12-10) to elevate the boys’ title, whereas Abia’s Okafor, who was on the point of defeat after taking a 2-0 lead, calmly claimed one other nationwide victory with a 3-2 (11-7, 11-6, 7-11, 3-11, 11-8) win to be topped the ladies’ U-15 champion.
In her remarks, Ogun State First Woman, Mrs] Abiodun, counseled the late Chief Molade Okoya-Thomas household for his or her dedication to the yearly occasion, notably for making it a nationwide occasion. She additionally envisioned the match going worldwide, given its standing as Africa’s longest-running desk tennis match.
Additionally talking on the finish of the match, Deji Okoya-Thomas, promised to proceed bettering the standard of the match, saying that the household has been inspired by the turnout and high quality of play in its first 12 months as a nationwide occasion.
