Nigeria continued her great form at the 2017 ITF/CAT African Junior Championship West and Central Africa qualifiers holding in Lome, Togo as no fewer than seven of her players were victorious on the second day of action at the tournament featuring 15 countries.
With four wins from five matches on the opening day, the defending champions stepped up the gear enjoying the highest number of wins as hostilities hot up at the Stade Omnisports, Lome.
Marylove Edward had her match against Kouma Niangadov of Mali stretched to Thursday following poor visibility and the 12-year-old double forehand and double backhand player posted a 3-6, 6-3, 6-3 win to enhance her chances of qualification from the round-robin preliminaries. Omolayo Bamidele from Ekiti also won her match against a Togolese opponent 6-0, 6-1.
The duo of David Dawariye and Rebecca Peters also enjoyed comfortable wins in their first matches.
Dawariye of the Kodian Academy in Port Harcourt was too good for Paul Padio of Togo with a 6-1, 6-0 win while Kaduna-based Peters was awesome beating Marie H of Burkina Faso 6-0, 6-0.
Matthew Abamu also makes sure that the home fans went home disappointed as he defeated Togo’s M. Dossen 6-0, 6-1 while Micheal Ayoola beat Delmas Ntcha of Benin Republic 6-2, 6-3.
Abuja-based Saminu Abubakar kept Nigeria’s winning run with a 6-3, 6-2 triumph over Cedric Falalou of Togo while Oyinlomo Quadri began her quest to successful defend the girls’ 14 and under title she won in 2016 with a 6-1, 6-1 win over Hanah Minet of Cote d’Ivoire. Wilson Igbinovia, who made a winning start at the AJC was the only Nigerian to taste defeat on Thursday losing to J. Alipoe of Togo 6-1, 6-2 to the relief of the home fans who witnessed series of defeats of their players by their Nigerian counterparts.
