The much-anticipated Valuejet Para Table Tennis Open served off yesterday at the Molade Okoya-Thomas Hall of Teslim Balogun Stadium in Lagos with hundreds of players aiming to share from the N10.8m price money.
Nine African countries including the host country, Nigeria are in Lagos for the three-day tournament which ends on Saturday, December 21.
The players will compete in 44 events in singles, team and doubles events.
The President of the Nigeria Table Tennis Federation (NTTF), Ishaku Tikon said staging the tournament would help players that had already qualified for the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games to tune up for the sports fiesta in Japan come next year.
“This is a good development for table tennis in Nigeria and we are grateful to our sponsor for deeming it fit to support the championship. We are excited and we can wait for the tournament to kick off as our aim is to make it a ranking event by 2020 on the ITTF calendar.
This is another first from NTTF and we hope our players and visitors will enjoy the warmth of Lagos and Nigeria during the competition,” the NTTF boss said.
According to the project consultant, Sunday Odebode, the aim of the tournament was to expose the players to world class tournament particularly as they are expected to compete against some of the best players in Africa.
“We want to use this competition to develop para table tennis in Nigeria while also promoting the talents of the players. We believe this tournament will enhance the sport as well as give us leverage to stage and be listed among the ITTF tournament in near future.
“Our players will also be exposed to competition among themselves and other players coming to Nigeria for the championship,” Odebode said.
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