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Tag: Segun Toriola

  • ITTF World: Animasahun, Oribamise lead others tocamp

    ITTF World: Animasahun, Oribamise lead others tocamp

    National junior sensations – Abayomi Animasahun and Tosin Oribamise will lead 18 others to the National Training Centre of the Lagos National Stadium for the camping ahead of the International Table Tennis Federation {ITTF} World Junior Championships in Cape Town, South Africa.

    Under the tutelage of seven-time Olympian, Segun Toriola, the players will be groomed in readiness for the world championship while the 10-man team will also be selected at the end of the camping on September 3.

    Some of the invited players were part of the team that featured at the ITTF African Junior Championship in Algiers where they qualified for the World Juniors, while outstanding players from the National U-16 tournament also made it to the camp.

    According to the President, Nigeria Table Tennis Federation (NTTF), Wahid Oshodi, the camping is necessary as some of the players would gain from the experience of Toriola, who has been celebrated globally for his consistency and discipline in the sport.

    “We are blessed with talents just like Aruna Quadri and we don’t want to lose the momentum by ensuring that we come through with our programmes. This camping becomes necessary as we want to select the best hands among the junior players so that they can also test might with their foreign counterparts at the world juniors. With the experience of Toriola and Michael Oyebode, who were both in Rio Olympic Games, I am confident that camping would have impart on the players and prepare them for the championship,” Oshodi said.

    He added: “The selected players will later go into close camping before the championship in November and they will continue to train in readiness for the competition. Toriola will surely depart to his base after the camping and we hope the coaches around can continue to sharpen the skills of the players before the tournament which has Egypt, Nigeria, Algeria and Tunisia representing Africa in Cape Town, South Africa.”

    The invited players are Abayomi Animasahun, Azeez Solanke, Amadi Umeh, Michael Abayomi, Augustine Emmanuel, Jamiu Ayanwale, Ololade Oyenekan, Tobi Falana, Etim Orok, Babafemi Babatunde and Umar Ibrahim for boys and the girls include Tosin Oribamise Agnes Onoja, Ajoke Ojomu, Alimot Ayinla, Rofiat Jimoh, Iyanuoluwa Falana, Vivian Akpan and Sukurat Aiyelabegan.

    NTTF will cater for the players’ feeding and accommodation while their states are expected to offset their transport fare.

  • ‘I’m the proudest person at 2016 Olympics’

    ‘I’m the proudest person at 2016 Olympics’

    An excited President of Nigeria Table Tennis Federation (NTTF), Wahid Oshodi is indeed pleased with the performance of the team at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games.

    He however, said that with more support table tennis has the wherewithal to win medal for Nigeria at the multi-sports competition.

    “I am quite pleased with the players. They have shown commitment and have strived to give their best. Everybody won a match and got into the main draw of the tournament and at this level that is not an easy task. They have all come together and supported each other even when support seemed to be lacking,” he said.

    The ITTF Nomination member added: “With Aruna Quadri’s excellent performance in reaching the quarterfinal and Segun Toriola getting to the 2nd round, I must confess that I am quite elated and proud of this team. They have done the country proud. This is by far the best performance by a table tennis team outside Asia and Europe ever and must be celebrated. If you also look at the quality of players that we defeated then one must take his hat off to the players. It is a phenomenal performance taking all the circumstances of our preparation into consideration.”

    He however, called for more support for the sport: “There is need for more exposure for our other players and coaches while more funding, increased and better quality coaching. We need to have at least eight male and female players consistently playing on the senior and junior professional tours. This will serve as an inspiration for the young ones coming behind especially when they see that they can build a financially rewarding career as people like Toriola and Oshonaike have done. We need to even work harder especially in the female category so we can sustain our achievements.

    I am fully committed to helping our players get to the top and really hope we can get the right support from Government and the organized private sector such as the Banks, Telecoms and Oil companies and our big Industrialists: this category of organizations need to focus a lot more on helping our home grown sports stars develop instead of chasing after the big earning premiership football stars.”

  • T/tennis: Toriola honoured as Nigeria make early exit

    T/tennis: Toriola honoured as Nigeria make early exit

    NIGERIA’S Olympics campaign in table tennis is over but not without some world recognition for the country’s Segun Toriola.

    The trio of Aruna Quadri, Toriola and Bode Abiodun were roundly beaten 3-0 by China in the men’s team event.

    Having proved bookmakers wrong in the singles’ event in which Nigeria produced the first African to make it to the quarter finals, expectation were high in some quarters but the defending Olympic champions, China, gave no room for errors as they dominated the match from start to finish.

    Quadri, who played the second game, was the only player who forced a fourth set against Ma Long ending their match at 3-1.

    With the defeat, Table Tennis event has ended for Nigeria at these Games with the team ranked 9th. The women’s team did not qualify for the team event.

    Despite the disappointment of an early exit there was something to cheer on the night following the special recognition accorded legend, Toriola.

    A colourful presentation was held at the Riocentro Pavilion 3 in Rio where Toriola was joined by three other table tennis stars that have competed in seven Olympic Games; Zoran Primorac (Croatia), Jörgen Persson (Sweden) and Jean-Michel Saive (Belgium) as well as ITTF helmsman.

    For Toriola, he hopes that his award can inspire more athletes to aim for the best in their career.

    “It is a privilege to be next to you both and receive such recognition. I am proud to be in the 7 club with such champions and I hope I can inspire more kids to start playing table tennis around the world. Thank you ITTF for this trophy and everyone for your kind words,” an elated Toriola said after the award.”

    After winning his preliminary round match against Canada’s Andre Ho, Toriola was drawn to play Sweden’s Jörgen Persson in round one of London 2012 but, unfortunately for the Nigerian player, that was as far as he could go as Persson won in five ends.

  • Olympics: Nigeria battles China in men’s table tennis

    Olympics: Nigeria battles China in men’s table tennis

    Africa’s table tennis sensation, Aruna Quadri will today return to table alongside his teammates – Segun Toriola and Bode Abiodun as the West African side takes on powerhouse, China in the first round of the men’s team event at the ongoing Rio 2016 Olympic Games in Brazil.

    The star-studded Chinese team who are the defending champion will be led by world number one, Ma Long as well as teammates – Zhan Jike and Xu Xin as they begin their title defence against the Africa’s champion. The trio of Ma Long, Zhan Jike and Xu Xin are ranked number one, four and three respectively in the world against Nigeria’s lowly-ranked side led by Aruna Quadri rated 40th in the world.

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    With the Chinese dominating the singles after claiming gold and silver medals in the men and women singles events, they will be aiming to add the team events to their laurels but they will have to start with Nigeria later today.

    Also, Africa’s flag-bearers in the women’s team event, Egypt will also be in action today against star-studded Singapore in the first round tie.

    In other men’s team matches, Great Britain will battle France – a repeat of the round of 16 encounter at the last World Team Championship in Malaysia. Sweden takes on the United States while host – Brazil will slug it out with Korea Republic.

    In the women’s team matches, host – Brazil will battle defending champion, China while Germany takes on United States.

    Winners of the first round match progress to the quarterfinal stage of the championship with the table tennis event ending on August 17.

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  •  Countries scramble for Toriola as coach

     Countries scramble for Toriola as coach

    The rapturous applause that attended his exit from the Table Tennis event of the Rio Olympics could have been mistaken for a victorious ovation.  Nigeria’s legendary table tennis icon Segun Toriola exited the Rio Games but held his head high the way only legends do.

    His conqueror, Japan’s Niwa Koki who beat Segun in the men’s singles event of table tennis joined in acknowledging the iconic star who raised his hands to return the sporadic applause.

    Not long after his defeat,  Toriola who made history by joining the elite stars’ club of players to have attended 7 Olympics turned out to be the beautiful bride who is sought after by many countries to sign as their coach.

    ‘’Countries are queuing to see who will out-bid each other to land Toriola as coach’’, a very dependable source said here.

    Interestingly, too, Nigeria is also desirous of landing the history maker as their coach.

    President of Nigeria Table Tennis Federation,  Enitan Oshodi said they’ve always been interested and would want to concretise the deal noting however that Toriola was still much fit to continue with his club functions. ‘’He’ll be an asset and has always been to our younger athletes. We’ll see how to make it even if it means living abroad and coaching from there as it were.

    The young man deserves all the accolades he gets. That is the result of discipline and hardwork. And honestly,  they are the things lacking in our youth players. They are in a hurry to ride expensive cars without working for it’’, Oshodi bemoaned.

    Just as the International Table Tennis Federation plan to honour his historic 7th Olympic appearance, there are feelers that officials of Team Nigeria are also planning to roll out the red carpet to this eminent Nigerian Ping Ponger.

  • Rio Olympics: Aruna Quadri sets African record

    Rio Olympics: Aruna Quadri sets African record

    *** qualifies for quarter final

    Nigeria’s Aruna Quadri on Monday night emerged as the first African ever to make it to the quarter finals of the men’s single table tennis event at the Olympics.

    Quadri, in a thrilling encounter, beat his German opponent, Boll Timo, 4-2 to seal a historic berth in the quarter finals of men’s single table tennis event.

    Before Monday’s win, Quadri was only at par with legend, Segun Toriola, who at the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games in China, made it to the fourth round of the championship.

    After an awesome display on Sunday in which Quadri caused a major upset in Round 3, beating Chinese Taipei’s Chuang Chih-Yuan 4-0 , many knew it would be suicidal to bet against the Nigerian who seemed to have hit his peak at the right time at the Olympics.

    In 10 minutes, Quadri blew away his German opponent, winning the first three sets 12-10 12-10, 12-5.

    However, German star, Boll who is ranked number 10 in Rio, halted Quadri’s run as he took the 4th set and 5th set 11-3, 11-5.

    In the keenly contested 6th set, Quadri held his nerve to win 11-9 and thus entered into the history books as the first African table tennis player to go this far.

  • Nigeria’s Schedule at the Olympics

    Nigeria’s Schedule at the Olympics

    Barely 20 Hours to the kick-off of the much expected 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro in Brazil, a full schedule of the sporting activities in which Team Nigeria will participate has been released.

    As the Olympics is scheduled to start on Friday, Nigeria will first feature in a Group B Men’s tournament football match against Japan after which the country’s flag bearer at the Olympics, Funke Oshonaike and her male Table Tennis counterpart Segun Toriola, will participate in the preliminaries of the table tennis singles.

    Thereafter, Nigerian football team will play the second leg of the Group B match against Sweden on Sunday at about 2:00am Nigerian time.

    On Monday, the Basket Ball team will take on their Argentine counterparts in the first leg of the Group B match of the men’s tournament.

    Team Nigeria will participate in Rowing, Football, Basket Ball, Table Tennis, Boxing, Athletics, Swimming and a few others.

    For the full schedule, kindly click here

  • Toriola gets ITTF recognition for Olympics feat

    Toriola gets ITTF recognition for Olympics feat

    Just like the International Olympic Committee (IOC), the sole custodian of table tennis globally, the International Table Tennis Federation (ITTF) has recognised the feat set by one of Africa’s most decorated athletes, Segun Toriola as the world table tennis ruling body identified with the record to be set by the former African champion at Rio Olympic Games in Brazil.

    In the media guide released by ITTF, Toriola’s feat was listed on page 15 stating, “Nigeria’s Segun Toriola will be playing his seventh Olympic Games in Rio, which is the most of any African athlete from any Olympic sport.”

    “Sweden’s Jorgen Persson, Croatia’s Zoran Primorac and Belgium’s Jean-Michel Saive have played in 7 Olympic Games, most of any table tennis player. Nigeria’s Segun Toriola will join them, as he plays his 7th Olympic in Rio,” it stated.

    The best African performer at the Olympic Games is Segun Toriola whose outing at the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games in China became the reference globally. Toriola’s biggest achievement at the Olympic Games has been reaching the Men’s Singles 1/16 final at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, beating amongst others former world number 1 Jean-Michel Saive as well as David Zhuang. His 1/32 match-up with Jean-Michel Saive was seen by many as one of the highlights of the Men’s Singles Tournament. He narrowly lost 4-3 to heavily favoured Oh Sang-Eun in the 1/16 final.

    From record of table tennis at the Olympic Games, no African player or team has won medal but Nigeria is among the 15 countries that have featured in the table tennis event of the Olympic Games since 1988 when table tennis became a medal hauling event at the Olympic Games. Others are Sweden,Australia, Austria, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Hong Kong, Hungary, India, Japan, Korea Republic, Poland and the United States.

    Among the six countries that have always have both male and female representation in the table tennis event of the Olympic Games, Nigeria made the list while others are Canada, China, India, Japan, Korea Republic and the United States..

  • Rio: Criticisms trail Mikel’s appointment as Nigeria captain

    Rio: Criticisms trail Mikel’s appointment as Nigeria captain

  • Olympics: Table tennis team won’t disappoint Nigerians – Abiodun

    Olympics: Table tennis team won’t disappoint Nigerians – Abiodun