Team Ghana continued to rack up some impressive performances in the singles event of the Badminton competition but the Tables Tennis team missed out in their bid to secure medals in their singles event on Day-4 in the ongoing African Youth Championship in Gaborone, Botswana.
Badminton:
Ghana’s boy’s number one seed Abraham Ayittey advanced to the quarter finals of the boy’s singles event after beating Algeria’s Mohammed Amine Guelmaoui 21-17 21-19 at the Police College Indoor facility in Otse, Botswana.
Ayittey had earlier accounted for Congo’s Tony Tshizanaga Mutombo winning 21-8 21-1 in a one sided second round game, after drawing a bye in the first round.
The Takoradi based player is set to play Mauritius’ first seed, Julien Paul in what has been billed as the highlights of Day-5 at the AYG on Monday, 26 May.
Meanwhile, Abraham Ayittey and Diana Archer came back from a set down to beat their counter parts from Botswana to qualify for the quarter finals of the mixed doubles event.
The Ghanaian youngsters won 14-21 21-18 21-8 in a tensed fight for victory to set up a clash with Mauritius on Monday.
Ayittey and his boy’s doubles partner Mohammed Adam drew a bye in the first round of that competition and have advanced to the next stage of the competition.
However, Team Ghana suffered some early exits in the singles games.
Mohammed Adam lost 2:0 to Botswana’s Tumisang Olekantse while Diana also lost 2:0 to Nigeria’s top seed Dorcas Adesokan in round two. Similarly, Victoria Asmah lost 2:0 to Egypt’s Farida Mostafa.
The competition continues on Monday, 26 May with some exciting match ups in the singles and doubles events.
The Head coach of the Badminton Team, Jacob Wilson commented about his team’s performances.
‘It’s been an improvement over the previous outing. They played with more dedication and commitment and also listened more and digested what they were told by the coach,’ he said.
‘If all goes well, we will have to do better than yesterday,’ Coach Wilson added.
Table Tennis:
Isaac Amoako and Eve Adom Amankwah missed out on a place on the medal podium in the Table Tennis Championship at the African Youth Games following defeats to their Mauritius and Congolese opponents respectively on Sunday at the National Youth Centre in Gaborone.
The duo went into their individual quarter final events on the back of some impressive displays in the first and second rounds but came unstuck against their more tactical and experienced opponents.
Adom placed 6 in the subsequent placement matches while Isaac came 8 overall.
Head coach of Team Ghana, Mr. Owusu Ansah is keen to dwell on the positives of participating in the Games, noting that this was the first time since 2008 that Ghana had competed in a major African Championship.
Ghana have won two silver medals in the African Youth Games so far with both medals coming in the Weightlifting competition.
Juliana Arkoh set the ball rolling with a silver medal in the girl’s 63kg category on Friday and was soon followed by Christian Amoah who also won silver in the men’s 77kg weightlifting competition.
The athletics competition starts on Wednesday, 28 May.
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