Nigeria’s hopes for a strong performance in the men’s table tennis event at the Paris Olympic Games have faded.
On Saturday night, Aruna Quadri and Olajide Omotayo, the Nigerian duo, suffered disappointing losses in their first-round matches.
In a thrilling round-of-64 match at the South Paris Arena, 20-year-old Eduard Ionescu of Romania stunned Aruna, who had advanced to the quarterfinals at Rio 2016.
Despite leading 3-0, Aruna lost 3-4 in a nail-biting contest.
Ionescu, making his Olympic debut, staged an impressive comeback after losing the first three games (11-8, 11-9, 11-6).
He won the next four games (11-8, 12-10, 11-9, and 13-11) to secure a spot in the round of 32.
Meanwhile, Omotayo suffered a 1-4 defeat at the hands of Iranian Noshad Alamiyan, dealing a significant blow to Team Nigeria’s morale.
Incidentally, Omotayo had started the game brightly; winning the first set 11-6, but the Iranian turned the tables round, dominating the next two sets, 5-11, 4-11.
There was a moment of hope for Omotayo in the fourth set as he started making up for the unfortunate previous two sets, but it was not enough as Alamiyan fought through to win the set 10-12 before sealing victory 8-11 in the final set to see off the game.
