Just as it has been happening and it will surely be so again at the 13th African Games as defending champions Egypt may face their arch-rival Nigeria in the final of the table tennis event for men and women taking place at the Accra International Conference Conference Centre in Ghana.
Egypt and Nigeria dominated their groups in the preliminary round and they have been drawn away from each other until the final and from the look of things, what happened in the last previous editions may be brewing in Ghana this year.
Meanwhile, Egypt and Nigeria as well as Algeria, Tunisia and Madagascar have booked their places in the quarterfinal of the men’s team event.
Egypt emerged leader in group 1 after beating Ethiopia and Gabon 3-0 each to maintain their 100 percent record while Nigeria, drawn in group 2 alongside Congo DR and Mauritania had a 3-0 win over the two teams to top the group.
Algeria also beat Angola and Guinea with 3-0 margin to progress to the last eight, while Tunisia defeated Cote d’Ivoire and Kenya to progress.
Madagascar edged Ghana and Sudan to join the league of the elite teams in the quarterfinal.
But the battle for the remaining three slots in the quarterfinal will be jostled for by the second place teams in each group to determine the quarterfinal pairing.
In the women’s team event, Egypt, South Africa, Nigeria and Tunisia have booked their spots in the semifinal round of the event after topping their groups while they will take on other qualified teams in the quarterfinal on Thursday, March 7.
Meanwhile, the President of African Table Tennis Federation (ATTF), Khaled El-Salhy has commended all the participating teams for the standard of play while hailing the host – Ghana for putting up a good atmosphere for the event.
“I am so excited that we have over 29 countries in the event and we are particularly happy with what Ghana has put in place to ensure the success of the event. We are lucky to be the first sport to start competing at the 13th African Games and this has shown again that table tennis is fast returning to Ghana just like it was in the 1970s. we look forward to more exciting matches just like what we had in the finals of the singles event which is a good advertisement for table tennis to the world,” he said.